


Lady of Winterfell

by Salamon2



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-29
Updated: 2018-07-24
Packaged: 2018-12-08 15:51:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 28,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11649795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Salamon2/pseuds/Salamon2
Summary: In each chapter I shall explore a different world where Ned had a different wife than Catelyn, and how it alters the world of Westeros.





	1. The Broodmare

**The Broodmare -- Barbrey Ryswell**

  
  
  
Her father had always told her since she was a little girl that she would one day be the Lady of Winterfell. It had been his prime aim and goal since she’d been pushed out of her mother’s belly—far more than raising her gaggle of brothers to be good lords and honest men. Far more often he’d let them run as wild as the stallions in his herd. But she and Bethany? They were special… the mares upon which the future of the North would be ridden. Plans were made, and betrothals were arranged. It had been a few generations since the Ryswells and the Starks intermarried, and father had decided that the time to do so again, was now. But father had been too late to snag Brandon, and so—after much arguing and persuading, and giving up Roger to be fostered at Winterfell, Barbrey was betrothed to a Stark, Eddard Stark, Brandon’s younger brother. Father wasn’t deterred, it was a foothold in the door and Starks tended to marry Starks when they could to consolidate claims and keep from favoring their banners too often. One day, a daughter of Barbrey’s body might be Lady of Winterfell, and she the Lady Mother.  
  
  
  
However, at the same time, Father invited young Brandon Stark to ride out to their hall from his fostering in Barrowton, and as the years passed turned a blind eye when Brandon Stark had focused all his time and attention on her. Brandon after all would be Lord of Winterfell one day, and he’d remember whose daughter he wanted more than any other, and what Father likely dreamed of is then Brandon would set aside the Southron match made for himself and her match to his brother. At least that’s what she imagined father told himself as he’d ignored how frequently Brandon and she would sneak off from the Great Hall or ride off across the Rills without even her brothers for a chaperone. He’d had to have known. He wouldn’t have been so blind. Gods, he might have goaded them on by forbidding it and then doing nothing about it. That though had been to Barbrey’s detriment when she had begun to quicken with Branda. And yet all that achieved was the end of her betrothal when brought before Lord Rickard in private, and a shameful secret trip to the Snowy Sept. After all there was little need for the entire North to know the reason for the end of the betrothal agreement, especially when Lord Rickard jealously kept Roger as his squire. There might have been rumors that flitted about, but no one had dared say anything to her face—at least then. It had among the privacy of Septas, she gave birth to her Branda, her first little wolf pup, who had then been given to the Septas to be raised as one of their own. Sometimes, when required to travel to White Harbor, she looked among the sea of novices as they gave alms to the poor and wondered which one was her daughter.  
  
  
  
Brandon, when he’d been told by her of all that had occurred, had been furious. And yet for all of Brandon’s bemoaning attempts to wriggle out of Lord Rickard’s Grand Southron plans, they had been wrong about Brandon. Brandon had complained up until the day that he’d rode south to marry is Southron bride, though he told to Barbrey he didn’t want to. His actions clearly said otherwise she had to admit now, years later.  
  
And then Lyanna had to go and throw everything into chaos, as Roger said she had a bad habit of doing.  
  
  
  
Brandon had been put to death by decree of the King, Rickard had been as well—with Roger bearing witness to it all and held as the King’s prisoner. Sudden death was a hard thing to account for in one’s schemes and plans, so she thought she couldn’t blame her father on that account in the least.  
  
  
  
Father then rode to Winterfell and insisted the newly minted Lord Eddard uphold his previous betrothal and honor, but the betrothal had already been agreed to be put aside as Lord House Tully demanded that the Starks keep their pact if he were to enter the Rebellion—and the other Northern lords now were eager for allies in the South to help in their war making and with Roger a prisoner—or worse dead at the hands of the King, as they had yet to learn of his fate at that time—Father had had no choice but to ride south with Lord Eddard. Or at least that’s what his raven had said, but then again, Father had always been bad at getting the exact arrangements he wanted, even when they were wrapped and presented to him.  
  
So she’d been hastily married Willam Dustin, her cousin through her Dustin mother and the newly minted Lord of Barrowton upon the death of his grandmother. Willam had not been unkind. Good-hearted, trusting, and at ease with himself and the world, Barbrey had hardly known how to react to Willam at first. She kept expecting that the façade of this kind man would one day fall to reveal a man in the mold of her father, but for as little time as she knew Willam, the man had been something of a puzzle to her.  
  
  
  
Lord Eddard returned from the war to discover his newly married Tully wife had died giving birth to a son, a Tully looking son, but a son nevertheless. He returned additionally with a Snow under his arms that looked more like him as the days came and went.  
  
  
Willam did not return from the war, though the seed he’d left behind had taken root in her womb and blossomed into his son and heir, who she named Cyrell. When the time came though she’d been ill-prepared for the events that came next due to her confinement. Derrick, an old greybearded uncle of Willam’s who should have died in the war and yet had found some reason to live, had returned with the Barrowton men ahead of Lord Eddard who had remained in King’s Landing for the marriage of the new King. Adair, bringing news of Willam’s death, had swooped in and spread rumors of her father’s schemes to seize Barrowton and the Barrowlands to give his herds the room to run and trample all over the fields of the smallfolk and lords of the Barrows. An angry mob that was surprisingly well armed took The Great Barrow unawares one night and Barbrey found herself just managing to flee on the back of her black stallion with her son swaddled and tied near her swollen aching breasts. She was accompanied by a few men and some of her ladies. All of this had happened within a fortnight of giving birth and had yet to come out of confinement with her son.  
  
  
  
Her party had raced east stopping only to rest their lathered horses—expecting that the raiders would expect her to ride west to her father and pursue her in that direction. She instead had intended to ride for her sister at the Dreadfort. Adair would rue the day he challenged her when Lord Bolton arrived at Barrowton. Riding east brought her to the King’s Road when she came across Lord Eddard at the head of a small trail of men himself, including her brother, her dearly missed little brother, Roger. She recognized him even at a distance.  
  
  
  
Barbrey dug her heels into her stallion and galloped down the hill to the band of travelers upon the road without thinking. Lord Stark’s men saw her oncoming figure and moved rather quickly into a formation to block her sudden approach, causing her to have to slow her stallion to an easy trot as she drew close. Only then did Cyrell’s wails reach her as the thundering of hooves stopped beating in her ears.  
  
  
  
“My lady, what brings on such necessity?” called out a stout man who was surely the captain of the guards.  
  
  
  
“Roger, my little brother! You’re alive… gods be good, you’re alive!” Barbrey cried out, overwhelmed with joy at seeing him. She must have looked quite changed, for until she called out his name, Roger had not looked at her, but now she saw the recognition in his eyes.  
  
  
  
“Barbrey?! Is that truly you?” he asked amazed from the other side of the guardsmen. Behind her she could hear her own party approaching, no doubt having finally noticed her absence.  
  
  
  
“Allow Ser Roger’s sister through,” called another voice, and Barbrey turned to see her liege lord, Ned Stark, returned from war and complete now with a beard he’d grown since leaving. He’d been a clean shaven boy when he’d called the banners at Winterfell. But now he and Roger both sported an unkempt growth—which in Roger’s case looked to be several years older with a streak of grey or two running through it. In fact, Barbrey took a long look at Roger as the guardsmen parted to allow her through. He was far more gaunt and lean than she remembered. The boy who’d held her as she’d cried and who she’d kissed on his cheek as she said goodbye to at Winterfell the last time she’d visited him at his foster home had grown taller and was far more hallowed of face. He looked to be more than a stone underweight, and hardly more than a sack of bones and skin, given the way his clothes hung loose on him. His hair was long and thin, his beard long and bedraggled. She gasped as the skeleton of a man sat upon his pale white horse in her brother’s clothes.  
  
  
  
“You’re a mother, Barb,” he said at long last as Cyrell began to hiccup, drawing her attention back to her son.  
  
  
  
“Aye… Willam’s last gift to me,” she said as she felt Cyrell begin to fidget within his bundling. That usually meant he was hungry or had messed himself.  
  
  
  
“What are you doing out here, Lady Dustin?” asked Lord Eddard.  
  
  
  
“A rebellion, no doubt led by my returned gooduncle, overtook The Great Barrow at the end of my confinement with Cyrell.”  
  
  
  
Roger’s reaction was both immediate and determined. His gaunt face narrowed even further. “That is outrageous!” he declared.  
  
  
  
“He must have thought that with Lord Eddard still not returned, that he could take Barrowton and have me killed and say it was in childbirth and have none be the wiser.”  
  
  
  
“Except you escaped,” concluded Lord Eddard.  
  
  
  
Barbrey snorted, “Aye, he likely expected me too tired and frail to escape. The man has never given birth to a child, or else he’d know you need be anything but tired and frail.”  
  
  
  
Lord Eddard looked away at that comment, causing Roger to give Barbrey a glare. What had she said? Lord Eddard though seemed unaffected, his face as still and unmoving as a sheet of ice in winter as he then said, “Come Lady Dustin, your party can return with us to Winterfell, where I shall gather my levies, and then we shall ride to deal with your gooduncle.”  
  
  
  
And so he did. That was one thing Barbrey knew she could count from Eddard Stark—that he’d do as he said he would. He was very predictable in that way. Rather boring after Brandon, but then Brandon was a fun man to play around with, but not live with. While Eddard gathered his levies and Roger fumbled about trying to regain what strength his time in the capital had cost him, Barbrey contented herself to visiting the nursery in Winterfell where Cyrell had been installed upon her arrival. Truth be told she rather hadn’t thought of herself as the motherly sort—and even now she thought Cyrell looked something like a cross between a frog and a pig, but some part of her didn’t trust others to look after Cyrell—her best claim to control of Barrowton now—and so she took it upon herself to feed him and watch over him as he played with the nursery’s other occupants.  
  
  
  
They were clearly Lord Eddard’s sons, twins most likely—though one was dark as Stark himself and the other reflected his dead Tully mother. Barbrey recalled two of her little brothers coming out much the same. Cyrell was younger than them both, but eager to catch up with them when Barbrey found them playing on the floor with Winterfell’s old nursemaid and a younger Dornish one watching them as they rolled over and crawled and attempted to learn how to stand. It was a strange sort of feeling to watch one’s own son to be so happy in the company of the twins.  
  
  
  
And as the days turned to weeks and weeks turned to a moon, Barbrey grew accustomed to her stay in Winterfell. It was then into that reliable world then came her elder sister, Bethany. Dressed in Bolton colors of Pink and Red, Bethany almost managed to make the house colors seem rather fitting as they complimented her manner of dress. That she came bringing her own toddler son, Domeric simply overran the castle and Benjen’s impatience with the amount of younglings toddling and crawling about.  
  
  
  
“Oh my dear little sister… I was so worried when I didn’t receive an answer to my raven weeks and weeks ago, but thank heavens you had the health, grit, and determination of a well-trained mare to rush off when you did,” she exclaimed when they had at long last secured the privacy of the nursery for themselves.  
  
  
  
Barbrey “I wasn’t going to see my son stripped from my protection and his title… and beyond that, I was simply lucky when I escaped that I ran into Lord Eddard.”  
  
  
  
“That you were, that you were.” Bethany echoed with an odd smile that Barbrey had rarely seen throughout their childhood. She reproached saying, “It’s just a shame that father says you’ll have to marry again.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey blinked, completely caught off guard by what she thought was Bethany’s complete change in subject. “I would think that what father wants should matter little. I have my son, and he’ll need me to protect and teach him how to rule Barrowton.”  
  
  
  
“Haven’t you heard?” questioned Bethany a little too innocently.  
  
  
  
Barbrey leaned in and admitted, “Father has not written me at all. Last I heard of him, Lord Eddard had been trying to rouse him from the Rills before he sieged Barrowton, with little success.”  
  
  
  
She continued with an appropriated reluctance. “Well, he’s joined his forces to Lord Stark’s and apparently got him to agree that with little Cyrell here as Lord Dustin, you should return to father’s care so as to marry again, and have Roger stay in Barrowton in your place.”  
  
  
  
“Barrowton is mine!” hissed Barbrey.  
  
  
  
Bethany was all sympathy as she laid her hand on Barbrey’s and held firmly in assurance and added, “Believe me sister, I know, and you have my full support, but… well, you do have to admit your being driven out of the Great Barrow and being so surprised as you were by Ser Derrick does not speak well of your leadership of Barrowton, I’m afraid.” She sighed, and then tutted, “Father says that Lord Eddard would feel more comfortable with a man looking over the town… especially considering how quickly the smallfolk turned on you after Willam’s death was declared publicly.”  
  
  
  
“That’s not what Lord Eddard told me before he left,” disputed Barbrey, growing suspicious at how the otherwise honorable Lord Stark would even consider going back on his word.  
  
  
  
Bethany gave a genuine little laugh that she’d often given Barbrey when they were younger and she’d declared such things as Ser Symeon and his sapphire eyes must have been true. Bethany let go of her hand and patronizingly patted her arm as she declared rather confidently, “Men, they say one thing and do another when out of sight. My Roose is exactly the same way… he likes to leech his body every now and then. I find it utterly repulsive, but he says it takes out some of the “bad humors” to keep him calm. I forbid him use leeches when I first found him doing it, and not a moon later did I find a particularly fat one full of blood wriggling on the floor of his solar one afternoon. Lord Stark may have promised you Barrowton, sister, and you may likely remain its lady in name until you marry again, but father is sure Roger will be its ruler in your son’s name while father considers which widowed lord of his to wed you to.”  
  
Offended by the mere suggestion she even consider remarrying, she protested, “Willam is hardly dead and Father talks of me marrying again?! And with Cyrell still at my breast?! Has he no decency?!”  
  
  
  
“You already know the answer to that one. It’s father, you know how our little brothers are all turning out now that mother’s dead,” Bethany eluded with a shudder at the mere thought of their grubby little brothers who were as wild as herd of stallions who’d never lived within the walls of a decent castle.  
  
  
  
Barbrey scoffed and proclaimed with much frustration, “There has to be some way to counter this, I won’t let him marry me off like some broodmare!”  
  
  
  
Bethany sat back and made a tremendous show of trying to think of something, eventually appearing to have an epiphany and say, “There is something you could do… but it’d require you to do something you don’t want to.”  
  
  
  
Naively she begged her sister to tell her what she should do, anything to keep Cyrell at her side, and all too easily Bethany laid what became her plan plainly for her to see.  
  
  
  
  
  
When Lord Eddard returned to Winterfell in triumph—her gooduncle Ser Derrick having met the King’s Justice—she made a point of observing when he went to visit the nursery for the first few days of his return to learn his routine. Bethany had remained at Winterfell to help her in her task and helped her by reporting his movements so that Barbrey wouldn’t be suspected in their plot to outwit their father.  
  
  
  
One afternoon, for Lord Eddard always came into the nursery to play with his sons after a few rounds of swordplay with Ser Rodrik in the practice yard, he found her there waiting for him.  
  
  
  
He entered, properly spent from his time in the yard, and ready to be a tame wolf for his little pups to play with. One thing Barbrey had to credit Lord Eddard with was his skill with a sword. Old Lord Arryn had done one thing right, Andal though he was, in teaching Eddard how to use it as he did. Seeing him in the practice yard the few times she had snuck out to watch him herself had made her understand Lord Eddard in a manner she hadn’t before. He fought as though it were the only way to release whatever emotions he kept hidden behind his icy mask. In a weird way seeing him let down that mask and see the frustration, anger and sadness that lay beneath made her all the more curious as to what made Lord Eddard tick. This curiosity was only increased when comparing this man who hid behind many a mask, and then allowed himself the part of the tame wolf for his boys.  
  
  
  
And this afternoon, he arrived with his guard down and into her trap. She had delayed giving Cyrell his noonday feeding for as long as she could bear to hear him cry and thus would be late enough to be in the nursery with Lord Eddard.  
  
  
  
He entered and immediately flushed half in embarrassment at walking in on her feeding a rather greedy Cyrell—who a minute before had been crying and grabbing for her. A moment later Eddard’s lordly mask had returned and he was all apologies. “You’ll forgive me, Lady Dustin, but I hadn’t expected… I should be going.”  
  
  
  
She called before he could leave completely, “I am only feeding my son, Lord Stark, nothing I am sure you’ve not seen many a wetnurse do before me.”  
  
  
  
“Um, well… aye, ‘tis true,” he stammered like a boy half his age might, a rather endearing sight, if Barbrey was honest with herself.  
  
  
  
Giving a slight smirk, Barbrey knew that what she said next could in fact determine the future of Cyrell.  
  
  
  
“Don’t let my feeding my son disturb your visit, I wouldn’t wish to disturb your time alone with your sons,” stated Barbrey.  
  
  
  
Lord Eddard opened his mouth, as if to respond, but then shortly closed it thereafter, as if whatever point he would have made was of little use against hers. He then entered the nursery proper and hurried over to the shared crib where his wolf pups were laid. Barbrey continued the feeding and watched as the tame wolf finally made his appearance as his sons gurgled at his approach, causing for a brief moment a small glimpse of a smile to appear on his face. A rare thing that Barbrey had yet to see.  
  
  
  
After a long enough silence had passed, and she’d managed to burp a now full Cyrell, Barbrey began her approach towards the crib. As she placed Cyrell down inside of it, she added, as if explaining, “Your sons do you a credit, my lord. Why, they’ve quite taken to my Cyrell. They’ll be sad to see him part when the time comes.”  
  
  
  
As Cyrell joined the twins, the darker one then looked up to Barbrey and her breast that she’d conveniently forgotten to cover up once again. It had been left unexposed for Lord Eddard’s sake, but instead she now found the darker twin reaching up, no doubt hungry for his own feeding. Sensing an opportunity, Barbrey reached down and picked up the dark twin—Jon was his name, aye for old Lord Arryn—and allowed him to finish off the breast that Cyrell hadn’t had his fill of. If anything it would allow her bosom to be completely emptied for once.  
  
  
  
“You’re feeding Jon,” commented Lord Eddard with a surprise.  
  
  
  
“Is he not your son?” quipped Barbrey.  
  
  
  
“Aye, bastard-born though he may be,” admitted Lord Eddard.  
  
  
  
“B—bastard?” questioned Barbrey in a small voice. She then recovered as gracefully as a mare who had missed her jump and asked, “I had thought that Lady Catelyn had died giving birth to twins.”  
  
  
  
“Nay, Catelyn died giving birth to Robb, and Robb alone,” sighed Lord Eddard, and suddenly all that anger, frustration, and unexpressed emotion Barbrey saw in the practice yard made so much more sense. Of course Eddard hadn’t wanted a marriage to the Tully fishmonger—his bastard son spoke well enough of how much he’d cared for her.  
  
  
  
“And you are raising your natural son alongside of your heir like this?”  
  
  
  
He was silent for a moment, looking oddly at her as she nursed his bastard before admitting, “They both have my blood.”  
  
  
  
“And both lack for a mother,” commented Barbrey as Jon finished his fill and began to squirm in her embrace. Carefully she placed the Snow back in among the babes, and now began to cover herself.  
  
  
  
Lord Eddard left that comment alone as he allowed his Tully boy to gum his fingers. Cyrell, seeing what enjoyment Robb was getting from the experience, joined him and Barbrey watched to see if Lord Eddard would complain and withdraw his fingers—he did not.  
  
  
  
“I must remember this, Lord Dustin, when you’re of age and seeking my permission to marry,” mused Eddard with a small smirk as Cyrell teethed alongside his Tully son.  
  
  
  
“My Lord, I hope I don’t sound too forward, but have you given thought as to your sons’ futures?”  
  
  
  
“Vaguely… Old Nan and the wetnurses shall see to them for the nonce… and after that…”  
  
  
  
“And after that, they should know a mother’s attentions, my lord. You would not wish them to approach the marriage beds having no understanding of a lady, would you?” she asked, knowing that old Jon Arryn’s own wife had died early on in Eddard’s fostering. She hedged her bet and held her breath.  
  
  
  
“No… I had a taste of that myself… Would that I could find such a woman willing to raise children not of her own body,” said Eddard pointedly.  
  
  
  
“But if she already had a child of her own…” suggested Barbrey, knowing that would garner his full attention. His gaze finally meeting hers for the first time in the conversation had at last gained her what she’d plotted for all this time. For Cyrell she pressed forward.  
  
  
  
“What I mean to say is… in a few moons time, the lords of the North will begin to visit you, and they will just so happen to arrive with their own virgin daughters who are in sore need of a husband. They will try and win you with their wiles, or their beauty, but none shall truly take any concern in your sons… and should you have any children off of one of them, they will of course put their own child with you ahead of your two sons. My only thought was… well, is, and it isn’t a very good one I’ll admit, but it’s what I thought might be of help to you, is that you might request your widowed ladies visit as much as your lords and their daughters in these moons to come. A woman who already has children of her own will of course have concerns for their well-being, but they shall not interfere with your sons, who they surely will come to see as one of their own.”  
  
  
  
Lord Eddard was silent then, his face once again donning the icy mask she was accustomed to seeing outside of this moment.  
  
  
  
“Forgive me, it was a stupid silly notion, I shouldn’t have said anything,” said Barbrey as she made a calculated move to leave, but was stopped by Lord Eddard along the way.  
  
  
  
Rather bluntly she was told, “If you want to marry me, Lady Dustin, come out and say it. I’d appreciate the honesty more than whatever game you’re playing at.”  
  
  
  
She did her best to play the innocent. “Me? Oh, I didn’t mean me. Willam’s death is too close… too fresh for me to even consider the possibility. I was only speaking out of a concern for your sons. They are such sweet babes, and I’d hate to think of any woman you’d marry treating them poorly.”  
  
  
  
At this Lord Eddard let go her arm and hung his head before saying rather quietly, “Lady Dustin, I must extend my personal apology to you. I had meant to say something before, but with word of your gooduncle’s seizure of Barrowton… there hadn’t been the time.”  
  
  
  
“And what, my lord, could you have to apologize to me about?” questioned Barbrey.  
  
  
  
Eddard turned and once again met her face with his lord’s mask. “It was on a mission of my own that your Lord husband died.”  
  
  
  
She queried, “Of your own?”  
  
  
  
He continued, “Willam died in a small melee… against the three Kingsguard who held my sister hostage. I—I was there when it happened, though there was little I could do to help.”  
  
  
  
“The three Kingsguard? Which ones?” she asked.  
  
  
  
Lord Stark answered calmly, “Ser Gerold Hightower slew him in the fight.”  
  
  
  
As Cyrell now playfully tumbled with Robb, Barbrey regarded Lord Eddard once again, and a question popped into her mind immediately.  
  
  
  
“Where are his bones?”  
  
  
  
Lord Eddard looked askance and admitted, “Buried in Dorne where he fell. I… we couldn’t bring back so many bodies ourselves.”  
  
  
  
“How many died?” she asked, unhappy that Cyrell’s father was not to be laid in a barrow with his fathers.  
  
  
  
Lord Stark continued on, stating, “I rode out with eight men, only Roger, Howland, and myself survived the fight.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey stared at Lord Eddard for a moment before she felt the heat of the nursery get to her. She couldn’t stay inside it any longer, she had to escape, and so she excused herself from his company and hurried herself to the godswood, only barely making it to the gates before she let out an anguished scream all her own.  
  
It was then that Barbrey began to question why this sudden surge of emotions came up from within her. She hadn’t loved Willam… no, had she? She’d been fond of him, aye, that’s what it was… fondness. He had been her second cousin twice removed from her mother’s side, and she’d seen him many times when his mother had brought the shy boy he’d been up into the Rills to learn to ride like a proper lordling should. He’d been a small, quiet, shy boy then, hardly worth noticing, and too easily embarrassed when Bethany and she would tease him of how short he tended to be. But then, they’d married… and Willam had not been unkind. As he had always been good-hearted, trusting, and at ease with himself and the world, Barbrey had hardly known how to react to Willam at first. She kept expecting that the façade of this kind easygoing man would one day fall to reveal a man in the mold of her father, but instead the bashful boy still managed to appear in their bed no matter the number of times they had consummated their marriage in the brief time they had before the Rebellion. For his men and his lords, he was a quick-witted, inquisitive, and stern figure, but with her… the unassuming boy he still was. At the time she’d thought it a product of having teased him on his visits into the Rills, something that would fade with time and more maturity… something she now realized she would have missed when it would have departed… now that even the promise of a fully mature Willam was gone to her. A war-weary, and tired Willam who would have turned to her as only a man can turn to his wife. He deserved better than to just lay and rot somewhere in the Dornish desert. He should have lived to see their son, to be the father Cyrell would need. That he wasn’t to be there, suddenly for the first time in the moons since she’d heard of his death finally hit her and like an unleashed avalanche, sadness and grief came tumbling down and out of her in sobs and tears she hadn’t known she’d saved for him—hadn’t known herself capable of, to be honest. Mother had died when she was very young, too young to understand the loss, and the loss of Brandon had been like the loss of a mare she had rode a few times—upsetting, but nothing on this deep heart wrenching scale. But for Willam, Willam of all people she now felt as though she were tearing apart at the weight of all the grief, as though everything had been torn and denied her with his death, and that the world would miss that bashful, quick-witted, and laid back man-boy.  
  
  
  
Bleary eyed and rather mournful, Barbrey trudged deeper into godswood until at long last she came to the heart tree, where she allowed herself to fully let go, and cry before the gods.  
  
  
  
Hours must have past for when at last she felt herself unable to cry anymore, the sun was low on the horizon, and the first stars were beginning to appear in the sky that she could see through the thick canopy. She had made a bed for herself in the grass at the foot of the weirwood and made a point to rise carefully so as to not accidentally fall into the black pool of water before her. It was as she moved she saw something else move on the other side of the pool. Whatever it was had been sitting there in the dark for some time, and it took her gaining her balance and blinking through the sting of her tear-drained eyes to see the shape of a man, Lord Eddard.  
  
  
  
He looked as though he had sat there for quite some time.  
  
  
  
“Do you have a custom of watching others pray in your godswood?” she asked rather sharply.  
  
  
  
“Forgive me, Lady Dustin, I did not wish to disturb you, but—”  
  
  
  
“But you wished to continue our conversation?” she finished for him.  
  
  
  
“In a matter of speaking, aye. I beg your pardon, my lady, for my suspicions earlier. Willam had spoken of you often while accompanying me in Dorne… but you… you had not asked after him once. I had thought, wrongly I now see that you had not cared for him.”  
  
  
  
“Just because I don’t go tripping lightly with my tongue, doesn’t mean…” she paused and took a rattled breath of air before continuing, “doesn’t mean he didn’t mean anything to me.”  
  
  
  
“I see that now.”  
  
  
  
“Is Barrowton safe to return to, my lord, or is it still on edge?”  
  
  
  
“Your brother was to send a raven when he believes the town’s spirit has quieted down. I shall inform you of its arrival as soon as I am made aware of it, if you wish.”  
  
  
  
“Thank you,” she said coldly and left him standing there in the godswood.  
  
  
  
Bethany was all questions the next day, but Barbrey held her tongue, deciding that if she returned to Barrowton and father wished her to marry again, she’d force him to attempt to siege the town rather than go willingly to whatever marriage bed he decided for her. She would find her own husband or not at all. When at long last the raven did arrive from Roger, she was eagerly packed and ready for the journey by the end of the sennight.  
  
  
  
Lord Stark was good enough to see her off from the courtyard of the castle, his two sons held by their wetnurses as Barbrey positioned Cyrell to be held by her as he had on the journey to Winterfell. The first sign that this would be more hassle than she imagined was when her horse was found to have thrown a shoe and needed the attention of the blacksmith immediately and delayed her journey by a day. The next was when the axle on the cart carrying her provisions gave out and required a wheelwright, which delayed her yet another week. But the final strike against her and her plans was when Cyrell, separated from Lord Stark’s sons began to wail and fidget mightily—and they in return—as though the very thought of separation was so terrible a thought to all three of them. That last one she ignored and pushed through—steeling her ears to try and ignore Cyrell’s wails and his punches and kicks where were horribly placed against her bosom. The only thing that would keep him quiet on the first leg of the journey was putting him on her breast, and unfortunately he drained them all too quickly for her liking.  
  
  
  
Roger met her at the East Gate into the walled town with a gaggle of greenboys dressed in Dustin surcoats. He looked a little filled out in his frame compared to when she’d seen him last, but still very thin. Beside him, proudly seated on a red stallion, was her father, his beard had acquired a bit more grey since she’d last seen him, though it still had a healthy mix of the chestnut brown hair that she’d inherited from him.  
  
  
  
“Daughter,” he acknowledged sternly before Cyrell wailed at the disruptive timbre of his voice. Father softened immediately as a crooked smile stretched across his face.  
  
  
  
“And there he is, I hear my grandson. He sounds rather robust, like I am!” beamed Father proudly.  
  
  
  
Roger rolled his eyes and added, “Aye, the little Lord Dustin sounds very robust.”  
  
  
  
“Was there any question of his health? He takes enough milk, for two babes.”  
  
  
  
“You aren’t feeding him yourself, are you?” questioned Father.  
  
  
  
“Sometimes I let his wetnurse feed him when I haven’t enough for the greedy imp,” acknowledged Barbrey with a sigh.  
  
  
  
“A noblewoman isn’t a cow to be milked. You’ll give him over to his wetnurse and stop thinking you have udders.”  
  
  
  
“He is my son, and I shall raise him how I like.”  
  
  
  
“He is Lord Dustin. And you shall raise him according to the honors due to his rank,” Father said with a rather stern look crossing his face just then.  
  
  
  
As they rode through the town, Roger hung back with her so they could discuss without Father overhearing as they passed through the streets which thronged with smallfolk happy to see her return.  
  
  
  
“I thought Bethany spoke with you,” began her brother with a bit of a hush.  
  
  
  
“You convinced her to come to Winterfell?”  
  
  
  
“Aye. Why didn’t you listen to her?”  
  
  
  
Barbrey bit her lip before answering, “I tried wooing Lord Eddard… and found how much Willam meant to me instead.”  
  
  
  
“What?!”  
  
  
“Not so loud.”  
  
  
  
“I told her to tell you to try and convince Lord Eddard to keep Cyrell there a little while longer until I could get Father to return to Ryderhal.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey remained silent and gave her little brother a meaningful glance. Clearly Bethany had her own agenda at play, and whatever it was, it was clearly not aligned with Barbrey’s.  
  
  
  
Lord Ironsmith, one of father’s minor bannermen arrived not long after Barbrey did. His horse was lathered from the pressing ride—or perhaps simply from hefting his meaty weight upon its back. He was a man closer to forty namedays than thirty, and had already gone bald to the point he preferred to keep a shaved head than grow out any hair. It was clear from both Barbrey’s memories and his stature that Lord Ironsmith had in his youth been handsome and fit, but years of idleness and ale had left him with a growing girth and waist. He laughed too much at father’s poor attempt at japes, and had a habit of biting his nails when he thought no one was looking. He disagreed with father on one matter, and it was one that made Barbrey hate him all the more.  
  
  
  
Father, who had taken to sitting on the Lord’s dais along with Barbrey began the conversation over a rather indigestible bit of salted pork, pretending as though she weren’t in the Great Hall of the Great Barrow at all. “It’s nearly been a nameday since my goodson died, and yet my daughter continues to playact her sniveling and wearing her widows’ weaves. Tell me, Ivan, don’t you think it’s due time she gave up this mummer’s farce?”  
  
  
  
Lord Ivan gave her a meaningful glance, his pale blue eyes meeting her as though he were secretly on her side, and said, “Well, Lord Willam was well beloved, a fair warrior, and a good man. I cannot blame your fair daughter for mourning the loss of such a _giant_ among men as he deserves. In fact I salute her for it.”  
  
  
Roger sighed and rolled his eyes at the response. Objectively there wasn’t anything wrong with what Lord Ivan said, except in how calculatingly he expressed himself, conveying no breadth of feeling or any true or recognizable human emotion whatsoever. Brandon had been bold, brassy, and cocky—quite literally when he’d been in her. Willam had been bashful, easygoing, and sweet. Neither had been as conniving, articulate, or cold as Lord Ivan Ironsmith.  
  
  
  
“I believe _my sister_ is tired, my lord, or else she’d have answered you straight away,” interjected Roger with a pointed glance and the added emphasis of placing his wine goblet down rather loudly to bestir her, should all else have failed.  
  
  
  
“What?”  
  
  
  
Lord Ivan smiled like a toad and said, “Such exhaustion given the events of the past few moons is more than understandable. Lady Barbrey has had more than enough to tire the Undying of Qaarth.”  
  
  
  
“It’s enough to tire any woman who’s out of her depth,” added Father before taking a swig of his ale.  
  
  
  
For that alone, she wanted to return with her own quip, but the opportunity provided by Roger was more than enough excuse to beg leave of the table and escape the odious company of Lord Ironsmith. She had to stop herself from running out of the room when afforded the opportunity to escape. Roger met her in her chambers later that night.  
  
  
  
He entered in a rage akin to how he’d been before King’s Landing.  
  
  
  
“If you even think of accepting that bloody arse for a husband, I’ll kill him and drag his body behind my horse!”  
  
  
  
With a smirk she embraced her brother warmly and kissed him on the cheek before saying, “Mayhaps I should accept him then, simply to be rid of him.”  
  
  
  
“I’m serious, Barb, don’t accept him.”  
  
  
  
“And what convinced you I had completely lost my senses??”  
  
  
  
“You didn’t slap him when he insinuated a woman needed a man to lead her like a foal,” admitted Roger with an indignant snort.  
  
  
  
“Is that what he said when I was occupied in my mind?” she asked.  
  
  
  
“Aye,” answered Roger quickly and without looking at her as he broke free of her hug and settled himself in one of her chairs—stretching out like a cat or dog might.  
  
  
  
“I should tell father that it’s long past time that he and his friend returned home,” commented Barbrey as she moved a chair to sit opposite of Roger since he’d stolen her own favored chair.  
  
  
  
“At this rate, I don’t think either he or Lord Ironsmith are going to depart until you agree to a marriage,” sighed Roger.  
  
  
  
“I’ll have some of Willam’s men throw them out then.”  
  
  
  
“Barbrey…” warned Roger.  
  
  
  
“Roger,” she mocked in return.  
  
  
  
“Haven’t you noticed that father replaced most of your guard? They were killed either in the attack on the Barrow or during the siege.”  
  
  
  
“Rick, Cley, and Havern are still leading them, they will obey their leaders or be met with the King's justice like any other northerner.”  
  
  
  
“You must inspire loyalty Barb, if you’re to keep it. You can’t just demand it with very little—“  
  
  
"I am the mother to their future lord, his guardian and protector, and Lady of the Barrowlands until he is of age to take it for himself!"  
  
  
“There you go... that attitude is why you were attacked during Cyrell’s birth in the first place. Your men knew and loved Derrick, while you only demanded their loyalties with very little to show why they should be loyal to you. These men have fought beside Father, he rewarded them in your place, and while they are sworn to obey you and Cyrell, you are still too new for that loyalty to be worth much salt, and I wouldn’t test it at this point unless you want to be dragged before a weirwood.”  
  
  
  
“Then I’ll ride for Winterfell.”  
  
  
  
Roger sighed before nodding and agreeing mournfully, “It’s the only recourse left you at this point.”  
  
  
She and Cyrell left that night with a few of her ladies and Rick, Cley, and Havern as their guards. They encountered no resistance on the roads as by now all the men had returned home from the southern war, and life for everyone but Barbrey was returning to some semblance of normalcy. She arrived in Winterfell without being followed, Roger having agreed to say she wasn’t feeling well for as long as he could hide her departure.  
  
  
  
Lord Eddard greeted her with some surprise and what looked to be some relief—he wasn’t alone in the castle with only his brother for comfort—the Glover boys had descended upon the hapless wolf with their maiden sister, Erena; and Lord Cerwyn was on a day visit with his daughter Jonelle in tow.  
  
  
  
“I am rather glad to see you again, Lady Dustin, though I had not expected such a quick return,” announced Lord Eddard genuinely enough.  
  
  
  
“Cyrell missed his crib brothers, and what mother could deny her son what he wishes?” she played off.  
  
  
  
“Then come, to the nursery, we shall not deny the little Lord Dustin a moment longer!” announced Eddard rather good naturedly. It made Barbrey reflect as they climbed the steps to the nursery, Cyrell fussing in her arms as she carried him, that Eddard could be more than the solemn sulking man she had known in the moons following the war.  
  
  
  
Cyrell in fact was rather happy to be reunited with the young Tully and Snow, and she let them go about their babbling as Lord Eddard pulled her aside.  
  
  
  
“You were right, my lady.”  
  
  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
  
  
“I was not a week without company and Lord Cerwyn made it a point to visit with his daughter in tow. At first I had thought it to announce the birth of his son, but there has hardly been three days put together without Lord Cerwyn and his daughter making some excuse or other to impose themselves upon the hospitality of Winterfell.”  
  
  
  
Deciding that she didn’t wish to insert herself in Lord Eddard’s suitor problem, she asked a question, “And what do you think of Jonelle?”  
  
  
  
“Jonelle and Lya had been close as girls, and she was sweet then--though they had a habit of teasing your brother, I'm told. But even so, Jonelle doesn’t seem to be as keen on the idea of this match as much as her father.”  
  
  
  
“Until a few moons ago, Jonelle was heir to her father’s lands and set to inherit Castle Cerwyn. The birth of a much brother has overturned all her hopes, no doubt. And if she was anything like your sister, she likely has eyes for another.”  
  
  
  
In that moment, Lord Eddard oddly looked at his bastard with a worried look before returning to meet her gaze.  
  
  
  
“Galbart, Robett, and Erena arrived completely by surprise. Robett is to be married to Halys Hornwood’s sister, but they left a moon earlier than I would have and been spending that time here in Winterfell.”  
  
  
  
“No doubt hoping some sort of attraction will bind you and their sister together. And what does Erena think?”  
  
  
  
“She has been ever so gracious that it’s sickening,” he said with a look of disgust.  
  
  
  
“My suggestion about the widows then, have you begun looking into any of them?”  
  
  
  
“I have not. If word were to get round that I was _looking_ for a new Lady of Winterfell, I’d be swarmed with even more of my Bannermen. Lord Flint’s daughter, Lynessa, is of an age with me and he has yet to pay his respects, and the Greatjon has a few daughters of his own he'd love to see me wed, no doubt.”  
  
  
  
“I would not wait around for your lords to grow wise to your preferences, my lord. If you intend to marry, make your own choice and do it quickly, or not at all,” she recommended, believing that would be the end of his confiding in her. Once she had dreamed of having Winterfell and the Stark name, but now she simply was in a fight to preserve her hold on Barrowton.  
  
  
  
“And what brings you to Winterfell so soon after your last departure?” he asked, no doubt sensing her wish to be at an end to his troubles.  
  
  
  
“My father still hangs about Barrowton as if he were the ruler of it in his grandson’s stead. And he has a companion in an old widower he wishes to see me wed to.”  
  
  
  
“You are the Lady of Barrowton until such a day as your son is of an age to assert his own authority. I have so decreed it.”  
  
  
  
“My father is of another mind, and he wants Cyrell to have younger half-brothers should the family need them since my brothers do not intend to take wives just yet.”  
  
  
  
Lord Eddard was silent for a moment before saying, “I shall write to your father and demand he explain himself. You may be his widowed daughter, but he cannot expect you to wed again so soon after the loss of Willam.”  
  
  
  
She sighed in exasperation, “I can save you the raven, my lord. He was already complaining of my reluctance at near a year to the day of word of Willam’s death having reached Barrowton."  
  
  
  
“Then what do you wish for me to do, my lady?”  
  
  
  
“I don’t care if I have to round up an army to do so, but I will have my father gone from Barrowton and only able to return if I deem it so.”  
  
  
  
“And what keeps you from doing so now?”  
  
  
  
“My father has hired all the men to replace the ones loyal to Willam that died in the past few moons, and they are more loyal to him. And Roger says that if I were to throw him out, they’d turn on me and drag me before a weirwood and marry me to the old widower whether I wished to or not.”  
  
  
  
Eddard was silent for a moment before saying, “I will try and think of something that might solve your problem, but short of marrying a station higher than your father sits, I cannot think of any now. Mayhaps you should take your own advice and choose a husband who you’d wish.”  
  
  
  
And then the solution came to her in that instant—of course, it would solve both their problems… as she had argued before, but that had been part of Bethany’s plans… and yet here they were proving to be necessary.  
  
  
  
Rather hastily, before she thought better of it, she said, “There is only one lord I would marry, and I do not think even he would have me.”  
  
  
  
“Tell me his name, my lady, and I shall have him fetched to Winterfell where you can be sure—”  
  
  
  
“I am already sure,” were the only words she said, the only ones she felt needed to be said. Their eyes met, and she willed her thoughts into his.  
  
  
  
He took a little longer than a moment to come to her conclusion, but when he did his eyes went wide and his face became a pale icy mask.  
  
  
  
He admitted, “It would solve both our problems.”  
  
  
  
“It would.”  
  
  
  
Suddenly the room seemed to gain a certain icy chill to it, one which did not ease any as Lord Eddard bowed and departed, without giving Barbrey any indication as to what he’d decided.  
  
  
  
She discovered what he had decided when the rest of the Great Hall had been assembled, declaring his intention to marry her before his guests. Lady Jonelle looked relieved, Lady Erena frowned slightly before turning her eyes upon Benjen who looked rather uncomfortable under the older girl’s stare. Barbrey simply looked to Eddard who seemed resigned behind his icy mask of the Lord of Winterfell.  
  
  
  
They married before the weirwood tree in Winterfell, and it was only by her father’s insistence that a bedding take place that she was even naked on her wedding night. Eddard did not wish to consummate the marriage, and Barbrey did not force him to. They had married to solve other issues, and she began addressing them, attending the nursery often and reading the ravens Roger sent her from Barrowton of issues he could not solve himself.  
  
Moons past and she only came to consummate the marriage by accident. Eddard had grown rather quiet on Robb’s second nameday, withdrawing at the small feast to drinking too much ale that he needed help being put to bed. She had manservants help her get him into his chambers, and she dismissed them to see that Eddard’s boots and doublet were taken off so it wouldn’t wrinkle from sleeping upon it. As she had unbuttoned the doublet, he’d kissed her, something she hadn’t found displeasing at all. From there the night had devolved into a rather sloppy act of consummation. The following morning, when Eddard had regained his senses he apologized for his behavior.  
  
  
  
“You have a husband’s right to my bed, Eddard. And if I had wanted I would have pushed you off and left the chamber myself.”  
  
  
  
With great embarrassment, he said, “I would not make you feel forced, my lady.”  
  
  
  
“Come to my chamber tonight and we can discuss it further.”  
  
  
  
Ned began coming regularly to her chamber, most often to talk, and sometimes to satisfy the need they had of one or the other. Nine moons passed from their consummation and Barbrey brought a daughter into the world, who she promptly named Serena. She had the Stark coloring, but Bethany’s looks elsewise. Ned was so delighted to have a daughter that Barbrey began to grow fonder of her quiet wolf for that alone. It was not long after Serena’s birth that Bethany sent her son, Domeric to be a page for Barbrey in Winterfell. Ned accepted the Bolton heir sternly but kindly as well, and soon Robb, Jon, and Cyrell were old enough to begin begging Domeric to play with them, which he indulged graciously. He might have his father’s looks, but Domeric had Bethany’s eyes. The three boys followed Domeric wherever he went, emulating him as though he were their elder brother, and Barbrey wondered if it was the first time that a Bolton heir was so well favored among Winterfell.  
  
  
  
Years passed, and without even trying that much, Barbrey had acquired a veritable pack of wolves herself. Serena grew to be intelligent, pleasing the tutor that Barbrey had brought up from Barrowton to tend to the ravens and teach her children. She would not have a maester in either Barrowton or Winterfell, and with the death of Maester Walys, Ned acquiesced to her demands. Serena was truly gifted in intelligence and was able to calculate vast sums in her head. Only two namedays after Serena came Arya, who as she grew proved to be a climber, always getting to the highest of places rather quickly and expertly like a cat would. Old Nan said it came from Arya’s great-grandmother, who she’d been named for and been a Flint of the Mountain clans. Sometimes she would come mewling into Barbrey’s chambers, complaining of some dream or other that had bothered her of talking weirwoods, flying without wings, and three-eyed ravens. Barbrey always dismissed the dreams as nonsense, but still they persisted, in fact getting stronger and more persistent as time passed. But then persistence over time was one of Arya’s best traits. As soon as she was old enough, she swiped a knife from the armory and kept it on her belt wherever she went. Barbrey did not disapprove of this, even asking Ser Rodrik to teach her to use it properly when she so desired, to which Arya had hugged her mother fiercely in response. She was followed quickly by the twins, Brandon and Rickon. Brandon, or Bran as they called him, was tempestuous and as at home in a saddle as Barbrey or Roger had been at a young age. He was nearly as wild as his namesake, quick to anger and just as brilliant at his sums as his sister Serena—with whom he competed with complicated sum puzzles that only they enjoyed. His twin, Rickon, was quite cautious to keep himself clean and neat—and preferred sitting with Serena when she wasn’t engaged in sum puzzles as she sewed and gossiped with Jeyne Poole rather than run about with Bran or Arya, and he was rather keen on listening to a good song about some knight and his lady. Rickon was her odd wolf pup, but still a wolf nonetheless. He learned how to fight rather quickly, but took little joy in it, seeing it instead as what he must needs learn as a boy to be left alone in peace and quiet with his sister and her friends.  
  
It was not long after the twins birth that Robb began receiving visits from his Tully kin. First was Uncle Edmure who had been newly knighted and looked almost as if he could have been Robb’s father. Robb began to distance himself after Edmure’s visit, she noticed—something she didn’t realize fully until one late morning she had come to fetch the boys to the noonday meal and Cyrell and Jon had begged her to play one round of hide and seek with them. Robb did not beg, but he still enthusiastically played. The sneaks had hidden themselves well in the godswood, but eventually she had found them all and declared it was time to leave the godswood.  
  
  
  
“The noonday meal is ready boys, now come, we aren’t sluggish Southrons,” she beckoned, but only Cyrell followed immediately after. Jon had started to follow, but Robb was nowhere near them when Barbrey looked back to be sure they’d followed. Jon himself was turning back and rushing to where they’d been. Barbrey heard the two brothers talking and approaching then, slowly, and curious as to why Robb had hung back, hid out of sight behind an overgrown bush, but not out of earshot.  
  
  
  
“She’s not my mother, and she’s not your mother either, Jon,” Robb said.  
  
  
  
Jon was considerate, just like his father as he suggested, “Mayhaps not but she’s mother to Serena, Arya, and Bran and Rickon isn’t she? And they’re our siblings all the same. If she can be their mother, then she can be our mother.”  
  
  
  
Jon was eminently rational when he wanted to be, it's what Barbrey rather liked about him, truth be told.  
  
  
  
Robb pouted, “Uncle Edmure told me she’s only father’s wife.”  
  
  
  
Jon frowned slightly and admitted, “I don’t like your Uncle Edmure, he kept calling me Snow.”  
  
  
  
There was a silence then, and Barbrey, worried about what more she might hear called from behind the bush and made sounds as though she were looking for them.  
  
  
  
“Jon, Robb! Where are you two?”  
  
  
  
And that was the end of that conversation, though it never truly left her either.  
  
“Loving” Aunt Lysa came to visit next. From what Ned had told her, she was pregnant for the sixth time after five miscarriages. Barbrey wondered at the trout turned falcon as the slightly plump woman doted and snuck all sorts of sweets to Robb. The boy had never been so indulged. Barbrey out of pity allowed the poor woman some chance at experiencing a small part of motherhood for herself—perhaps unwisely. Where she tried to draw the line was the giving of sweets after the evening meal, but that only seemed to make matters worse. Robb still somehow kept getting the lemon cakes and pasties sneaked to him, they would keep him up all night, and they made him tired during his studies with the tutor and sluggish in his swordplay with Ser Rodrik. The heir to Winterfell couldn’t afford such setbacks to his education, and she let him know that repeatedly.  
  
  
  
“You must pay attention in your studies and swordplay, Robb. You are not a southron heir to your father's castle. The North will only follow strength, and your southron aunt will only make you soft,” she scolded intently.  
  
  
  
“Yes Lady Stark,” echoed the boy with a yawn.  
  
  
  
She added as he began to stumble sleepily away from her, “And tell your aunt that you can have sweets at any other time, in moderation of course, except after evening meals.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey additionally did not like how Lysa treated Jon—speaking of him as if he weren’t there, snubbing the child who was named in honor of her own husband. From the way she acted, it seemed she hardly cared a fig for her lord husband, and then considering the age gap between them, Barbrey realized she likely didn’t. What was worse was how Robb didn’t seem to notice how his “loving” aunt treated poor Jon. This was made apparent when Barbrey found Jon alone and crying in the old courtyard one afternoon.  
  
  
  
“Why are you crying?” she asked roughly.  
  
  
  
The boy needed coaxing, and at first he resisted telling her what exactly had upset him, until she could not stand his caterwauling any further and embraced Jon if only to muffle his crying in her clothes—though she had to admit… holding a boy who was her husband in miniature, unlike her children who seemed various pieces of herself and Ned meshed together, was rather gratifying. And whoever had made the boy cry would suffer from her sharp tongue.  
  
  
  
Finally Jon admitted, “Lady Arryn s—said I wasn’t really Robb’s brother.”  
  
  
  
To that she pulled Jon even closer. He was a bastard, aye, but he’d been Robb’s unflappable companion and confidant all his life, and to think that Lysa Arryn would take that away from either of them, only enraged her on the boys’ behalf.  
  
  
  
“Robb is your brother, a half-brother, aye, but he shall always be your brother,” she told him sternly, looking Jon in the eyes to make sure he understood she truly meant it. That more than anything ended his sniffles and tears, and Jon hugged her, which Barbrey discovered was more satisfying than the thought of what the falcon’s contorted face would look like as she told her off. And it remained as such, for Barbrey long after Lysa had stormed off in a fury.  
  
  
  
At the end of her visit, Lysa offered to foster Robb in King’s Landing with her husband.  
  
  
  
“He shall learn alongside the prince, and be a great an inspiration to my little one after he’s born,” she had said as she held her small swell in her belly and pleaded her case before Ned and her.  
  
  
  
Barbrey had to say, “Robb is an inspiration to his siblings already.”  
  
  
  
“Half-siblings,” interjected Lysa immediately.  
  
  
  
At that Ned had finally weighed in, saying rather more politely than she deserved for that comment, “Your offer is generous, goodsister, but I must decline it at this time.”  
  
  
  
The sour look on Lysa’s face after that encounter was something Barbrey would never forget.  
  
  
  
After that whole debacle then came sweet and shy Willam, her youngest until the babe inside her currently would at long last come out. Willam was quiet in a different manner than his father. Where Ned was quiet because he always seemed to be brooding about something or other, Willam seemed to hold his tongue because he seemed to know some secret that he only blushed to tell. He would speak when he chose to do so, but otherwise preferred to listen and watch than participate. Willam hung at her skirts much longer than any of his siblings, and she wasn’t keen to lose him, for in some strange way she saw her Willam in him—somehow, someway.  
  
  
  
As her pack grew, Barbrey began to grow concerned at what would happen in the future to her children. Robb was… well as admirable as a trout raised among wolves could be, but if his relations were any preview of the man he’d become, Barbrey worried for the future of her children. True, Brandon and Rickon could serve as castellans to Robb or Cyrell—or preferably bannermen if they were well rewarded. Brothers couldn’t always take care of their brothers though—the men would complain if you did that too often and overlooked what they thought to be loyal and leal service. And with three mayhaps four little brothers, she began thinking that Robb would get Winterfell and her sons might only have their married sisters to turn to, and if the brothers in question were of a woman who had been decidedly labeled a “not his mother”... gods she didn’t wish to think of it. She knew the songs, she knew that this sort of thinking was horrible, but the older Robb grew the more she dwelt on the fact that the southron fish had had the luck to sleep one night with Ned and beget him his heir, and there was nothing that Barbrey could do about it… well nothing decent as it were. These thoughts only grew worse when Cyrell had left her to learn how to rule Barrowton under the guidance of Roger. She tried very hard to treat Robb just as she did Jon—who she adored for being just like his father in so many ways even if he was a bastard, but the nagging thought would not leave her, and as the boy grew older she began to fear he knew what she thought when he looked her in the eyes, which only added to her shame and distrust of what Robb might do.  
  
  
  
It was then that a raven from the south arrived with word from King’s Landing announcing the death of the southron falcon lord of the Vale and Hand of the King, Jon Arryn, and the King’s march towards Winterfell. The same day that the dead direwolf bitch and her litter of pups had been found dead by a stag’s antler.  
  
  
  
“You know what he will ask of you,” she said that night, her long brown hair with a few streaks of grey in it cascading across her pillow. This would be the last time they’d have the ability to couple before she quickened too large with child. He lay with her in the chilled room, close to her side and falling asleep from their most recent round.  
  
  
  
“I do not have to say yes. I have a wife, a pack of ‘pups’ here in Winterfell, and a Wildling King Beyond the Wall who will need swatting down before the winter comes,” he said as he nuzzled her.  
  
  
  
“Two packs now, the children, and their pups, with one to spare for this Stark,” she said as she rubbed her swollen belly. She felt a kick in response, smiled, and dragged Ned’s paw-like hand up to where she felt the kicks, he smiled, even with his eyes half-closed, and leaned in and began to nibble at her neck with kisses which began the next round.  
  
  
  
She was lucky her confinement was a quick one, bringing Roger into the world just before the King arrived. As was expected, Ned was asked to be Robert’s hand and she was confident he would say no, until Robb disturbed them that very night.  
  
  
  
“Father, you must read this!” insisted the boy as he marched into her chambers. Thankfully Ned had had the foresight to wrap robes about their forms before allowing Robb inside.  
  
  
  
Ned frowned as he read the letter—too long to have been delivered by a raven, Barbrey saw, meaning it must have come some other way. A rider in the night mayhaps? Or some messenger hidden among the King’s party? Aye, either would do the trick. Ned finished the letter, his face adopting the icy set of his lord’s mask. Not a good sign.  
  
  
  
“You must tell the King!” implored the red-haired boy.  
  
  
  
“Tell the King what?” Barbrey asked, and without hesitation, Ned handed her the letter to read for herself as he continued his conversation with Robb. Her eyes grew large in response to what the sprawling script read.  
  
  
  
“Your Aunt reads half mad with grief, Robb.”  
  
  
  
“But if what she says is true.”  
  
  
  
Ned sighed and admitted, “If what she says is true, then… the King is in as much danger as your gooduncle was.”  
  
  
  
“You must do something then, father! How oft have you told me that Lord Arryn was a second father to you? Would you expect me to not avenge you if you were murdered?” implored Robb.  
  
  
  
By this time Barbrey had finished reading the letter and thought back to the woman who had visited Winterfell years and years ago. The woman who could not say Jon’s name without spitting it out as though it were poison on her tongue. The woman  
  
  
  
“There is something off about this letter,” declared Barbrey.  
  
  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
  
  
“I mean, think back to when Lysa visited us before. She hated speaking of her husband, and didn’t give much impression that she cared much for his health and well-being. And she detested your son.”  
  
  
  
“Well, Jon’s a bastard,” said Robb simply—no malice intended by the term. That was one thing thankfully that had separated himself from his Uncle and Aunt who had looked down and snubbed Jon on their visits.  
  
  
  
“He is named for her husband.”  
  
  
  
“Mayhaps she did not care for Jon much before, but has since come to do so,” proffered Ned with a meaning he did not need to say to her. She knew it was possible. Gods, highly more than possible, especially after the birth of a child to bind a man and woman together.  
  
  
“Why don’t you say the real reason why you suspect her, Lady Stark.”  
  
  
  
The invocation of her formal title caught her off guard. It hadn’t been the first time Robb had referred to her as such, but the way he had said it indicated that this time he meant something far different by it.  
  
  
  
“You suspect her of treachery because she is Southron. How many times have I heard you say that Southrons haven’t enough sense to piss in their own pots? Too many to count. You hate her and the entire rest of my family for being Southrons.”  
  
  
  
“I do not hate your family Robb, not when I am mother to more than half of them.”  
  
  
  
“You know what I mean, my _mother’s_ family—you loathe them, and by extension, me.”  
  
  
  
At this Ned could no longer play the part of quiet wolf.  
  
  
  
“Robb, you step too far.”  
  
  
  
Robb turned, a red fury flaming in his eyes as he snapped back, “And you’re too blinded from rutting with your broodmare to see the truth!”  
  
  
  
Ned stood in response to that, but that did not deter Robb.  
  
  
  
“See, she isn’t even angry about it like you are—because she knows it’s the truth.”  
  
  
  
Oh, that was the game he was playing then? Well, she could deny him that angry outburst he was looking for, gods she’d need to keep her head, if only to keep Ned from doing harm to the fool boy. She put her hand upon Ned’s arm, in hopes it would break what was surely a building quiet fury—given by how icy his stare became towards his firstborn.  
  
  
  
“Ned, he’s been about the Greyjoy boy too much. You know what kind of things Theon is like to say, Robb is only repeating them.”  
  
  
  
“It doesn’t excuse his use of them,” said Ned as he shrugged his shoulder of her touch. He then turned to Robb and declared, “You will return to your chambers where you will remain until I permit you to leave them.”  
  
  
  
Robb crossed his arms and declared rather boldly for a boy of four and ten, “I wondered if you were truly my father, or just her stallion put out to stud. Now I have my answer. When my blood needs help as much as you needed it in the war, you’ll turn tail and stay in the North like a coward—”  
  
  
  
Ned moved faster than she had ever seen him do before pushing his son forcefully up against the door to the room, and scaring the boy who’d let his mouth run too much for one night.  
  
  
  
“I said return to your chambers, did you not hear me?” snarled Ned in a manner most unlike him.  
  
  
  
Robb, wide-eyed and fearful fled from the room like a boy half his age might. Ned collapsed to his knees, staring at his shaking hands. Barbrey approached tentatively, but before she could comfort him, he stood and turned to her.  
  
  
  
“What has possessed that boy?”  
  
  
  
Barbrey assured him, “Tis the age. When I was about his age, I thought often of defying my father.”  
  
  
  
“Mayhaps…” he left unfinished, as though he were looking for some other explanation, and Barbrey couldn’t help herself.  
  
  
  
“After years of letters and visits, they’ve finally succeeded in turning him fully into a Tully.”  
  
  
  
Ned regarded her briefly before sighing and asking, “Was that what happened? Or have I been blinded to other truths?”  
  
  
  
Barbrey crossed the room and took him in her arms as he stood there.  
  
  
  
“Don’t blame yourself, Ned. There are many things I regret for Cyrell. He unfortunately has inherited my Uncle’s temper and impatience. Sometimes I wonder if in anything but appearance Willam left any part of him in my son. I have tried to counter that as best I could through the years to little avail. Robb is not lost completely though, you at least still have him under your roof and two namedays yet until he is a man grown. With time, and careful supervision of who he has correspondence with, he’ll see you made the right decision.  
  
  
  
Ned took her hand and smiled weakly saying, “I shall depend upon you to do so.  
  
  
  
Barbrey squeezed and reassured, “Of course my love.” And then Ned nodded and broke contact, and suddenly his true meaning began to take shape in her mind.  
  
  
  
“Wait… you can’t possibly be considering—”  
  
  
  
“Robb was angry, hot-blooded, and above all rude, but he was right about one thing.”  
  
  
  
“And that was?” Barbrey snorted more than asked.  
  
  
  
Ned looked at her earnestly and asked, “How can I expect my children to follow my example, if I do not set a good one to start?”  
  
  
  
She had no answer, so she tried to spin it another way. “You’re leaving us, your family because of that?”  
  
  
  
“I’m leaving for more than just that, to find the truth about Jon’s death, to punish those responsible if necessary, and to protect my family and my friend from that person, should I need to.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey said nothing, simply staring at Ned.  
  
  
  
“I won’t be long in the South. Like the Old Man of the North. I plan on being hand shortly, clean up the mess of that adder’s pit, and then leaving.”  
  
  
  
_If they let you live that long_.  
  
  
  
Thankfully, due to her own efforts, Serena had been betrothed to Domeric, who was visiting his betrothed after having been fostered in the Vale for his squiring at the Redfort. This, though, left Arya to be betrothed to the monstrous little Prince Joffrey. Besides Arya, Ned was taking Bran with him, her wild son who would feel cramped and confined in the Red Keep, but at least Arya would have a sympathetic shoulder to lean upon as the moons would go by. She told Ned to find some way to keep them active and keep them occupied. He promised her he would find some way.  
  
  
  
Robb remained confined in his chambers until it was time for Ned to depart, not from any order of Ned’s, but simply out of plain old southron stubbornness, and Barbrey told him as much.  
  
  
  
“Your lord father is to leave for King’s Landing this day. Won’t you come out and wish him well?” asked Barbrey.  
  
  
  
“He knows where I am, if he wants to say his goodbyes, he can come to my room as you have,” sulked Robb.  
  
  
  
Barbrey was about to scold Robb when she felt a hand on her arm, and she turned to see Ned standing there. She sighed, realizing it wasn’t worth the time and left father and son alone in the room.  
  
  
  
Robb did leave his chambers then, visibly wishing his father a good journey south and taking leave of the King and his court. As Ned mounted his grey stallion for the road, he reached down and gave Barbrey a kiss, probably the last she’d receive for a long while from him.  
  
  
  
“Come back to me,” she pleaded.  
  
  
  
“I will. In return, promise me something else.”  
  
  
  
“What?”  
  
  
  
“Promise me that you’ll look after Robb. I’ve spoken with him and he should be better behaved now. Help him rule the North, and see that he is safe. If something should happen to me---  
  
  
  
“Ned.”  
  
  
  
“If it should, he’ll need help. He’s still but a boy, after all.”  
  
  
  
“I promise,” she said, and she intended to keep her word.  
  
  
  
“Father, be safe,” interrupted Robb, who butted his way between her and Ned to take his father’s hand. Ned nodded his head and gave his son a sad smile before kicking his horse and leaving the courtyard.  
  
  
  
Robb’s public display of affection for his father, however, ended as swiftly as Ned had rode through the gates. He did not return to sulking, thank the gods, but instead choosing to smirk at Barbrey for what reason beyond finally succeeding where she had failed she knew not.  
  
  
  
Roger visited not a fortnight later, bringing papers that needed her signature, and sharing news of Cyrell’s growth that were too long for ravens to carry, or at least she had hoped as such. When properly alone in Ned’s solar, she asked, “How is my boy?”  
  
  
  
“He writes you often enough to tell you himself, I thought,” stated a beleaguered Roger as he slumped into his chair.  
  
  
  
Barbrey huffed, “That is the trouble with men. You think a short piece of parchment delivered once a moon, if that, by a raven is enough or that it could convey any meaningful information.”  
  
  
  
Roger smirked and shook his head, “He is a capable lordling, Barb. He will do you credit when he comes of age at last.”  
  
  
  
“Are all men so completely incapable of conversation as well? It’s a wonder we crawled out of barbarity at all. As boys you are all so eager and talkative, but something changes that as you grow older.”  
  
  
  
Roger shrugged his shoulders and said, “Eventually, you run out of things to say and figure it’s a better use of time to do things than talk about them.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey couldn’t help but laugh at that.  
  
  
  
“Truth be told though, and I wouldn’t be surprised at this from Cyrell if I were you, at a certain point boys feel the need to push away their parents, out of fear of seeming childish.”  
  
  
  
“And that certain age is now?”  
  
  
  
Roger simply nodded his head, and Barbrey groaned.  
  
  
  
“Well, at the very least, I can see him betrothed well while he takes his time pushing me away. Lord Tallhart has a sweet daughter named Eddara. She’s a little young yet to marry, but she would make an excellent match for Cyrell when the time comes.”  
  
  
  
Roger’s face fell slightly to what seemed to Barbrey a trained neutral mask—like one of Ned’s Lord’s face.  
  
  
  
“If you are to betrothe him, I would do it before he is a man grown.”  
  
  
  
“Has some maiden caught my son’s eye then?”  
  
  
  
Roger nodded rather carefully and then added, “Lord Barrows’ daughter, Anylla. She is a comely lass and rather charming in her own way. Cyrell is in pursuit of her as much as a hound is a fox. He is always finding some excuse to sneak off with her, and I once caught the two of them kissing in a dark passage. I scolded him and told him that if he truly cared for the girl he would think of her reputation, but I know it’s only made him attempt to be cleverer at outwitting me. Thank the gods I was just as young once, and know those tricks.”  
  
  
  
“Roger! And who at Winterfell would have been your fox in this den of wolves?”  
  
  
  
Roger blushed furiously in that moment, leaving Barbrey to laugh at the expense of her dear little brother once again.  
  
  
  
“I was only teasing. Don’t tell me, or I might never see the maidservant in the same light.”  
  
  
  
“Oh, there’s no chance of that… she’s… she’s no longer in Winterfell anymore.”  
  
  
  
“The hound caught his fox in the end all by himself? Well done Roger! I didn’t know you had it in you.”  
  
  
  
Roger gave a weak smile, one that did not reach his eyes at all—which looked as sad and forlorn for some reason as the day she’d seen him gaunt and war weary from the Rebellion.  
  
  
  
Barbrey put that aside, thinking that Roger was entitled to his secrets and, returned to the matter of her son, “Lord Barrows’ daughter however is not someone my son should be associating with.”  
  
  
  
“You’re not talking about what her great-grandfather did, now are you?” asked Roger with a groan of his own.  
  
  
  
“Aye, but it’s not just the betrayal Lord Barrows committed against House Dustin—though for that alone, my goodmother’s wraith would rise from the dead and haunt me until the end of time if I allowed this match. No, it’s more than that. Lord Barrows doesn’t have a pot to piss in that he can call his own. That he is still a lord is evidence of the Dustins’ mercy for House Barrows’ children, but it is a title in name only. Barrowton would revolt to hear of such a match.”  
  
  
  
“You’re exaggerating a bit, Barb. Lord Barrows has a small house in Barrowton, I’ve been there myself.”  
  
  
  
“A house, not a keep! And what were you doing there?”  
  
  
  
“Barrows was elected the Lord Mayor of Barrowton, I can’t very well ignore Barrowton’s chosen representative to House Dustin, now can I?”  
  
  
  
“When did this happen?” questioned Barbrey, her fingers drumming on the arm of her chair.  
  
  
  
“Nearly a nameday ago, now I recall why I didn’t want to tell you.”  
  
  
  
“You shouldn’t be keeping things like this from me, Roger!”  
  
  
  
“You haven’t been to Barrowton in nearly a decade. It is not like it was in our Lady Aunt’s day. Not even the greybeards recall when the Ironborn plagued the Little Rill’s shores and House Barrows betrayed the town by opening the gates for them. Life has moved on from that, and Lord Barrows has proven himself rather capable at his task as Lord Mayor.”  
  
  
  
“Even so, on the fact of how low they are, the match is horrendous to suggest.”  
  
  
  
“Barb, the Lords Dustin have been marrying the other high lords around the North for quite some time, twice from House Ryswell in the past three generations alone. There’s talk in Barrowton of Lord Dustin needing to consider one of his bannermen’s daughters. That’s the smallfolk words, and words are wind, but all the same, it might be just the excuse Cyrell might use when he comes of age to marry Anylla. That’s why I’ve said, if you truly wish to betroth him, to that Tallhart girl or anyone else, you best arrange it now, before he comes of age.”  
  
  
  
And so Barbrey threw herself into negotiations with the master of Torrhen’s Square. However she had only signed the agreement to betroth Eddara to Cyrell when word came from the south that Barbrey least wanted to hear. King Robert was dead and Ned was accused of treason, and held prisoner—having been discovered plotting to place Stannis on the throne, or so the parchment read. Robb was commanded to come south, and bend the knee. Arya would then be free to return to her family. No mention of Bran was made but then it wasn’t necessary. It was all but stated he’d be a hostage against Robb, especially as Robb’s heir.  
  
  
  
They were in Ned’s solar when the raven arrived with the news.  
  
  
  
“I told him not to ride south!” she exclaimed, slamming her fists against Ned’s own desk.  
  
  
  
Robb, stood there quietly and rather calmly for someone who had just been told his own father was taken prisoner. He only retorted, “That you did. Thank the gods he had the good sense to ignore you, do his duty and restore his honor.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey met Robb’s defiant eyes, and said pointedly, “I recognize your mother’s words.”  
  
  
  
“You should.”  
  
  
  
She laughed then, a small, half-hearted thing, that threatened to burst into tears if she continued it longer, but it was enough to earn a curious eyebrown raise from the young lordling before her.  
  
  
  
“Gods, you’re half Tully and yet you don’t understand the most fundamental part of being one. The line that the first Tully is infamous for having said when asked why he betrayed Tristifer Mudd in the end.”  
  
  
  
Robb was motionless, and she shook her head.  
  
  
  
“You don’t even know what I’m talking about, do you?”  
  
  
  
He had the good sense to bite his lip in that moment.  
  
  
  
“Family, Duty, Honor are my words, aye, but before duty and before honor, _Family comes first_. You’re certainly a Stark to have made that mistake.”  
  
  
  
She couldn’t help but laugh, it was better than crying in that instance. Her laugh was met with a slap across her face.  
  
  
  
“For years, I’ve watched and listened as you’ve slandered my mother’s family as Southrons, and never let your prejudice for southerners be mistaken for anything but utter detest and loathing. If I ever hear another word out of your mouth, Lady Stark, to that point, I’ll send you back to Barrowton without a second thought.”  
  
  
  
Robb said this with a smile, which tore into Barbrey and made her want to do something to him in return, but Barbrey recalled her promise to Ned, and what Roger had said about young boys. She was the only parent he had left to push away, should she expect any less treatment? Putting aside her detest for the moment, Barbrey stood and gracefully left the room as much as she could.  
  
  
  
Things only devolved from that moment onward. Robb called his banners to assemble at Winterfell without telling her until Lord Cerwyn was encamped with his men outside of the castle walls. She had to scramble to purchase enough supplies to keep the gathering lords and their men fed from White Harbor in order to keep Winterfell’s own Winter supplies from being exhausted. Robb refused to meet with her, and ordered the guards to keep her from entering his presence. She was still given respect as “Lord Eddard’s wife” which she was introduced as more often than naught, but her position as the Lady of Winterfell no longer seemed to matter as much as even the servants began following Robb’s lead in ignoring her. All that is, except Jon, who confronted Robb about her treatment, publicly unfortunately, and was thrown out of Winterfell for the trouble. Robb said he was sent to the Wall, but Barbrey wondered if that was the truth, and she began to lose sleep as she recalled Jon's tears after Lysa.  
  
  
  
When Cyrell arrived with the men from the Barrowlands, she was thankful to pull him aside. He was a little sullen, but still dutiful to hear her out.  
  
  
  
“You must tell Robb that marching south to bend the knee won’t work, no matter how many men he brings with him, the southrons will only take it as a declaration of war. He should be negotiating for the release of Arya and Bran, not preparing to march.”  
  
  
  
Cyrell rolled his eyes--an expression which looked rather odd coming from Willam's face. He sighed and said, “Robb hasn’t called his men to simply send them home, mother. And I thought you’d be pleased to hear why.”  
  
  
  
“No one tells me anything anymore, least of all Robb. Ned made me swear to look after him, and despite what he’s said and done, I will keep my word, but the boy won’t let me near him.”  
  
  
  
“He's marching south to rescue Lord Stark. As for speaking with you, I’ll talk with him and see if I can convince him to at least keep you informed of his intentions.”  
  
  
  
This of course had been her aim all along, and she lit up and exclaimed, “Would you, Cyrell?”  
  
  
  
Her eldest son, who looked so like his father, nodded his head, and she embraced and thanked him.  
  
  
  
She awoke the next day in her chambers to find even the last of her loyal ladies not in attendance, and the door locked. She was left there with a pitcher of water and her chamberpot, but without visitor or meals for three days. It was on the fourth day, tired, unkempt, needing a bath, and feeling rather weak that she heard the door unlock and she hopefully turned her eyes to the door, only to find Domeric there, waiting with Serena. Serena, her sweet girl came with a tray of foods that looked far too much than what Barbrey would normally eat, but she was starving and so dug into the food, forgetting to use even the fork and knife provided for her.  
  
  
  
“What Robb has done to you he should be ashamed of,” declared Serena with an anger Barbrey had never seen from her eldest daughter before.  
  
  
  
“What’s happened since I’ve been locked away?”  
  
  
  
“Robb has won the loyalty of the Greatjon and declared his intentions to move the army south to Moat Cailin.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey nodded her head. She had come to accept that her promise to Ned could not be kept, not when Robb wouldn’t let her.  
  
  
  
“What of Cyrell?” she asked with her  
  
  
  
“He’s marching with Robb and is just as close with him as he always was,” sighed Serena.  
  
  
  
“You mean, Cyrell just sat back and did nothing as I was locked away in here?” Barbrey asked after swallowing a particularly tough piece of venison.  
  
  
  
Serena looked away, while her sister’s eyes gave her the confirmation she needed from Domeric.  
  
  
“I pledged to stay behind, marry Serena now and wait until Lords Karstark and Flint arrived, and then promised to join up with Robb at Moat Cailin,” declared Domeric.  
  
  
  
“Domeric, what do you think of this southron folly that’s taken your soon to be goodbrother’s mind?”  
  
  
  
“A fool’s errand. He claims he is marching south to rescue his father, but any man knows he’ll never see him again, not with the Lannisters in control of King’s Landing.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey nodded, feeling justified that the other Northern lords felt as she did, but simply couldn’t bring themselves to say as much—especially if Robb had won the Greatjon if what Serena said was true.  
  
  
  
“Are you hungry for more, mother?” asked Serena, and Barbrey looked down to find her tray was empty. Gods, had she truly eaten all that food so quickly? Domeric caught her eye, and Barbrey recognized the same look she’d seen from his mother whenever she wanted to share a secret with her.  
  
So, despite beginning to feel rather bloated, Barbrey turned to her daughter and said rather simply, “Some soup or broth to warm my bones, Serena, nothing more.”  
  
  
  
Serena nodded and rose and departed the room. Domeric closed it behind her and then turned to face her.  
  
  
  
“Thank the gods for you, Domeric… I hardly know what would’ve happened to me without you here.  
  
  
  
“Grandfather sent me a raven a sennight ago.”  
  
  
  
Truth be told, since her marriage to Ned, Barbrey had hardly given a thought to her father and his scheming as none of it ever seemed to come to fruition. It had all seemed so petty in hindsight.  
  
  
  
“And what did the old ninny want?”  
  
  
  
“For you to return to Ryderhal and take care of him in his dotage.”  
  
  
  
Barbrey turned and gave Domeric a questioning look, but no emotion appeared on Domeric’s Bolton face.  
  
  
  
“If he expects me to abandon what children I have left to me—“  
  
  
  
“They are Starks and they belong in Winterfell. Serena shall look after them after we are wedded and I’ve gone south to join Robb. Your place is at your father’s side.”  
  
  
  
She was silent for a moment processing in her still somewhat clouded mind just exactly what this meant, eventually realizing and asking, “Even you, Domeric?”  
  
  
  
“My Lady Aunt, you are required by my grandfather’s ailing side.”  
  
  
  
“You and I both know he’s as hale as a horse!”  
  
  
  
“You will return to Ryderhal.”  
  
  
  
“No, I won’t!”  
  
  
  
“This isn’t a choice being offered, it’s a command. Or are you foolish enough to think that everything you’ve done has been by your own choice?”  
  
  
  
“Hold your tongue,” stated Barbrey as she glared at her nephew.  
  
  
  
For once, Domeric’s smooth face was painted with an emotion, that of surprise. “By the gods, I thought that there was some cleverness to you, but after all these years, you never once caught on to the actual game that was being played?”  
  
  
  
Barbrey did not answer, choosing instead to tap her fingers against her chair nervously.  
  
  
  
Domeric laughed, but coming from it sounded almost like icicles breaking in the melting spring, “My poor deluded Aunt. Did you honestly think that your father and mine would allow a widowed Lord Stark to marry again and have it not be you?”  
  
  
  
There was something to his tone that kept her silent from speaking, for once in her life being completely and utterly speechless. Domeric then collected himself and leaned in close to her.  
  
  
  
“I am to ride south with Robb, I shall be his right hand man and trusted advisor, as I have always been, thanks to you. And when he meets his end, as all Starks who ride south do, who else shall be there to rule in Rickon’s name until he is old enough than Lord Robb’s trusted advisor and goodbrother? You’ve served your purpose, Aunt. The broodmare you were and the broodmare you shall always be.”


	2. The Fallen Star

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ashara reunites with Ned after the Tower of Joy, and in her grief she commits an act which will tie her fate for the rest of her life, even if that life is spent with Ned. In this alternate reality, where Catelyn and her Robb died of the pox during the war, Ashara is given an extension on life, but can only outrun death for so long.

**The Fallen Star - Ashara Dayne**

 

Sometimes she looked up at the night sky and wondered where in the sky the star that Dawn had been forged from had fallen. The remaining rock that had survived was of course in the castle, her ancestor had built Starfall around it, and since there was a Sword of the Morning, it remained but an empty scabbard until the sword’s return to Starfall. But Ashara cared little of what she already knew. What she could not know though, that elusive mystery fascinated her far more. What bright star must it have been to then be snuffed out of existence and fall oh so far? Legend had it that the star had fallen from the Sword of the Morning constellation—originally its blade must have been longer it was said—but this made little sense to Ashara. After all, how could the constellation have existed before Dawn was forged?

 

The sun was beginning to peak over the horizon, turning the dark sky all shades of purple from a rich dark violet to a pale lavender in the east. She hadn’t slept that night, for some reason feeling the need to come out onto her balcony to stare up into the sky at the stars which glittered and twinkled so prettily. And as she sat and marveled at what was above her she wondered which one would be the next to fall.

 

“My lady, a rider approaches,” declared a manservant who had arrived a few moments ago and had made his presence known by clearing his throat before speaking.

 

Ashara looked up once again at the constellation and then sighed and stood. Her brother Asric was absent, guarding the Prince’s Pass on Prince Doran’s orders. Her goodsister was in confinement and due to give birth within a moon, and her young sister Allyria was but a girl of five namedays old, thus leaving Ashara effectively the Lady of Starfall in all but title what with father and mother so recently dead.

 

“From what direction does this rider come?” questioned Ashara.

 

“From the North, milady. The ferry awaits your decision.”

 

To the North lay the Prince’s Pass, Houses Fowler and Blackmont. Mayhaps this was a rider with word from Asric? Or mayhaps the rebel army was in the Reach? Either way it could be for good or ill, and the news was important enough to warrant riding through the night. The manservant awaited her command and finally deciding it better to be safe than sorry she nodded her head and said, “Send word to the ferry to bring him across.”

 

With only a nod, the man departed. Ashara then retired to her chambers to dress and make herself somewhat presentable to whomever this rider was. As she lit an oil lamp some whimpering was heard from the wooden cradle she’d moved to her chambers. Carefully and lovingly she knelt down beside her babe and hushed him to be quiet. Wylla would be up soon to dress her and nurse him, but in the meanwhile, her son would be lulled to sleep by the rocking of the cradle, soothing her northern son back to sleep. He looked so peaceful when he slept, almost like she’d found his father the night they’d spent together in Sisterton. The act itself had been sad yet sweet—full of grief and longing. She had had word of her father’s death then, and he his and his brother’s. But when he’d been asleep, his head resting on the pillow at such an angle as their son did now, he’d looked so calm and restive—for once at ease with the world and all in it. Gods see that he remain as such.

 

It was not long thereafter that Wylla came, groggy herself from having just awoke, and began to help Ashara to dress in a respectable but still somewhat heavy silk gown she’d brought with her from King’s Landing. It was a little tight around the middle, as Ashara had not yet lost all of the baby weight yet, and for some reason she doubted her hips would ever be as narrow as they had been, but at least the gown had been designed with her growth in mind so she could still force herself into it, with Wylla’s help. Oh how she longed to be in sand silks as Wylla tied her back up. Winter was beginning to ebb now, and the time for her sand silks would soon arrive, she reminded herself. In the meanwhile she would have to go riding soon, the rest of the weight she’d gained from bearing her son would not lose itself after all.

When at last she was all dressed, her hair brushed and neatly arranged, the sun and her son both had risen. Thankfully Wylla was able to quiet her boy by giving him a nipple to suckle on, and Wylla then took the opportunity to relax in the chair that Ashara had brought into her chambers specifically for nursing her boy. Wylla’s eyes began to close as Ashara departed, ready to meet this rider her brother had sent.

 

She arrived at her brother’s solar to discover a man she had thought had parted ways with her at White Harbor. At least at first glance when he stood and stared at her she thought it might be him. No, the more she looked at him, the more she began to question if he was the same man who’d rushed back to kiss her as she took a ship heading for Braavos. That had been a lean young man, beardless, and half a boy still. The man who stood before her seemed far more grown into his own body, and a moon’s growth now shaded the lower half of his face. He stood there as though it were only right that he occupy the space, far unlike her nervous and shy young husband who’d been her lover naught but a few namedays prior. He stood before her now both as her lover and not—more not she supposed now that he had had his war bride and babe.

 

She turned her eyes away from him and said nothing. Why had he come? Why now? After putting aside their secret marriage for an alliance, hadn’t this warrior’s son done enough to slay the sad shy young northern lad she’d found so sweet?

 

“Ashara,” he said after a long silence, taking one step closer to her.

 

Ashara however quickly had grabbed the latch of the door and said “Don’t”.

 

He was quiet again, no doubt confused as to why she’d refuse him. He still thought of himself as that young man… he doesn’t see the change, not yet. And Ashara felt her heart grow heavy, for she knew that while he was blind now, he would not be so for much longer.

 

When he did speak, he appropriated a tone far different from the one he’d begun. Gone was all emotion wiped away with a lord’s distant duty, “Lady Dayne.”

 

To that Ashara looked up and met this strange warrior’s eyes and replied, “Lord Stark. What brings you to my brother’s solar?”

 

Again he was silent. Gods, why did he have to bloody brood?

 

Finally he asked, “Must we?”

 

She continued, crossing the room to her brother’s desk and situating herself behind it to establish exactly what would be allowed from this point forward, saying, “I assume it’s some business about the rebellion north of the Red Mountains?”

 

His eyes, god, his grey eyes were the only thing that were the same, and they looked hurt, almost as hurt as the young girl’s had been when the raven had arrived saying that he would have to put her aside to wed the Tully trout. Some small part of her rejoiced in his experiencing in some small manner the pain the young girl had felt all those moons ago, but the other part wanted to reach out and take him in her embrace once again—forgetting the past. That was why the desk was necessary. It kept a necessary line between them.

 

“I came, to right a wrong I’ve done towards House Dayne.”

 

She bit her lip to keep from laughing. Any cynicism would only draw out this confrontation, and she would rather see this man on his way. She was prepared for a whole host of things, but she was not prepared for Ned to take off the two-handed sword in its scabbard at his side and lay it down on the desk before her. She was confused for a moment until she saw the pummel. Dawn. He had come to return Dawn. That could only mean… no. She couldn’t accept that, it wasn’t true. But the sword lay there, mocking her all the same.  
  
“Did you kill him?” was all she could trust herself to ask. She pleaded that it wasn’t so.

 

“He had been waiting for me outside of the tower where he and the other missing Kingsguard had been keeping my sister. They had prepared to die long before I arrived… and I wouldn’t have seen my sister without going through him.”

 

“Yes or no, did you kill him?” she asked. She knew that all the rest of what he was saying was important, but right now the only thing that mattered was whether he was the one to have done the deed or not.

 

“With help from Howland Reed, aye.”

 

She closed her eyes and felt the tears forming in her eyes. Knowing the legend that Arthur had once told her of the sword, Ashara opened her eyes and pulled the pommel from the sheath and unsheathed Dawn slightly though not completely. The pale white blade shone from the desk and she touched the edge of the blade to produce the necessary blood for the rite. Having drawn blood she began to hear whispers about her, as though the room had become filled with men besides Lord Eddard Stark, but she dare not look up from the glowing blade which now seemed to draw her in, calling for her blood... her Dayne blood.

 

“Ashara, what are you doing?” questioned Ned, his voice sounding distant and far away in comparison to the growing volume of the whispers.

 

“Seeing the truth for myself,” was all she said as she rubbed her pricked bloodly thumb upon the glowing blade—the blood seeping in to the pale white sword until it was no longer visible. Knowing then that she had little time to waste, she rested the palm of her hand upon the flat of the steel and felt the world around her shift as the sword faded away from her grasp and she felt as though she were spinning and falling—always falling. As the solar and Ned vanished from sight, other forms, darker forms began to surround her—unseemly wraiths, bloodied men who stared at her, most with violet eyes and pale blond hair, the foremost among them being Arthur, who shone the brightest while others seemed dimmer the further away from him you looked. Then the light which surrounded him intensified and blinded Ashara, forcing her to shield her eyes and close them. All the while the whispers from the men grew louder that she began to hear what they were saying.

 

“She shouldn’t be here!”

 

“She’s unacceptable!”

 

“She didn’t drawn the sword from the star!”

 

“Foolish girl!”

 

“It will be the death of you, like it was for all of us. It won’t rest until then.”

 

“Gods to be alive with such a beauty.”

 

“Live by the sword, die by the sword.”

 

“She knows not what she’s done.”

 

“It will never rest until it has her.”

           

“We will never rest until she dies.”

 

“Live by the sword, die by the sword.”

 

“She is a Dayne child, she will suffice.”

 

“No, she is no Sword.”

 

“Her blood is ours, and so is her fate.”

 

“Live by the sword, die by the sword.”

 

And then there was silence, complete and utter silence. Followed by the far-off chirping of a bird, then the feel of a light breeze upon her skin, and the sound of steel upon a whetstone.

 

She opened her eyes when she heard the sound of a sharpening blade. She no longer was in her brother’s solar, instead she was somewhere in the more desolate regions of the Prince’s Pass. She stood next to her brother who was standing guard as Ser Oswell Whent sat upon a rock, sharpening his sword’s blade. Elsewhere was Ser Gerold Hightower, sitting quietly in the shade of the tower and praying. They stood and sat there in their armor, as if waiting for something to come and attack, though their helmets were put to the side. And then she saw a cloud of dust appear on the horizon, which slowly formed into the shape of a small party of men on horseback led by Eddard. At a reasonable distance the party of men stopped and dismounted and approached armed.

 

Eddard did not at all seem surprised to see them, and they equally looked unsurprised by his arrival. This was not a chance battle—a mistake of identity, but a decided last stand, one which neither side could withdraw from. They talked briefly, the words sounding distant, echoing, and far away. Then the swords were drawn and suddenly everything became far less muffled as the ringing of the steel echoed in the air.

 

Ashara had never seen Arthur fight—at least not a true fight such as this, where actual death and blood was doled out—but to see him cut down man after man of Eddard’s companions and with what elegance and grace he did so, cast him as a dangerous and deadly fighter. Something that Ashara had never quite associated with him before, but to see him as he swung Dawn in battle was to see nearly another man entirely. His shadow danced across the ground nimbly. In fact, now that she watched, he fought better than he had when she’d seen him practicing to be worthy of a title as Sword of the Morning.

 

And then she heard the whispers.

 

“The time draws near.”

 

She turned and saw as part of Arthur’s shadow broke off, turning into one of the faded shadow men from before, and sat on a rock as Arthur slayed the last of Ned’s companions beyond Ned and his crannogman friend.

 

“Live by the sword, die by the sword,” whispered another, and Ashara turned and saw yet another, darker shadow appear not five feet from Arthur’s side as he disarmed Ned.

 

“The time has come,” whispered another, which now knelt neck to the injured, but not dead, crannogman.

 

“Stab him… kill him….” whispered another, which seemed to help the crannogman to his feet as Arthur forced Eddard to his knees.

 

“Kill him…” chanted the other shadows, which began to appear all about the scene—though none seemed to see them, except for the crannogman.

 

And so the crannogman leapt, just before Arthur was to have slain Eddard with Dawn, stabbing Arthur through the back of his throat. Arthur’s grip on Dawn loosened as Arthur himself fell to his knees.

 

“Finish it!” chanted the shadows, more appearing, now surrounding Eddard.

 

“Live by the sword, die by the sword.”

And so Eddard picked up Dawn and finished Arthur, rendering him free from his drawn out death with a deep gash across his throat, one which seemed to glow brightly as part of Arthur’s head flopped to the side and Arthur, shining brilliantly emerged from his own falling dead body. He stood there as a specter as Eddard took to the Tower. Arthur turned then and saw Ashara.

 

“What are you doing here, Ashara?” he demanded.

 

“I—I had to see for myself.”

 

“You don’t belong here!”

 

“Arthur—”

 

“You are not a Sword!” he snapped back at her, unlike himself in life.

 

And then suddenly one of the shadows that had surrounded Eddard before Arthur’s death now came and began grabbing at Arthur. Soon other shadows began doing the same—and the pull on Arthur seemed to distort him as he was stretched and fought against the pull for naught. More shadows began to pull at Arthur and he seemed to grow, dwarfing her as his stretched out form became duller as more shadows pulled and stretched and added to the writhing mass of light and shadow that had been Arthur, but soon seemed to grow into an amorphous mass.

 

The stretched mass still spoke with her brother’s voice, and yet sounded nothing like him all the same, “We will have you Child of Dayne, blood of the Fell Star. Your fate is bound with the Dawn. Live by the sword, die by the sword!”

 

And then the mass reached out and grabbed her, burning her skin with the merest touch, causing her to scream from the agony and everything to go dark and black.

 

~*~*~

 

Ashara awoke to find herself returned to her bed, hot and drenched in her own sweat. She gasped for breath as she looked about her. It was dark, but even so, the moon was up and shown through her windows. It cast a shadow upon Wylla’s chair that had been pulled beside her bed where there sat Eddard, who was asleep himself, and looked as though he hadn’t changed his clothes in near a sennight from how well-worn and disheveled he appeared. Her eyes then looked to her son’s cradle to find it empty, she nearly tore herself out of bed to be sure before her rationality recovered and soothed her with the thought that likely Wylla had taken her son with her, since Eddard had taken her chair. She took a few deep breaths, and then turned to look at the door leading to her balcony and had to blink from shock of what she saw. Someone was standing just outside, looking in at her.

 

“Arthur?” she called, questioningly—hesitantly. She’d seen him die, he should not be on her balcony now.

 

Arthur turned from the door and walked further out onto the balcony. Feeling the need to follow after, Ashara rose from her bed and followed after. She opened the doors, only to find the wind had picked up, blowing her sweat-drenched nightgown about her like a banner from a pole. Arthur was by the edge, looking down and over from the edge of the balcony and to the base of the Palestone Sword below.  
  
“Arthur,” she called out again, this time he turned around, his eyes a shimmering blue indigo, twinkling in the moonlight, drawing her closer. He stepped up onto the edge of the balcony, without even needing to look where he was stepping.

 

He beckoned, “Ashara, come…”

 

“Come?” she asked.

 

“Join me… It’s better than anyone knows, Ashara. A thousand hundred times better. I am the Sword of the Morning now—more so than I’d ever been before. And I want to share it with you.”

 

“I—I don’t understand…” she admitted.

 

“You can’t… but you will,” he whispered, holding out his hand for her to take. The next moment she took her brother’s hand—it felt warm to her touch. Warm, and alive! Arthur was alive! Arthur’s warm hand reached up and gently stroked her cheek before pointing up towards the sky.

 

“Come and dance among the stars.”

Arthur took a step up once again, smiling as she now looked up at him, welcoming her to follow.

 

“Ashara no!” called a voice as clear as day, and Ashara reflexively turned to see Ned rushing towards her from her compartments.

 

“It’s all right Ned… Arthur’s returned.”

 

“Arthur’s dead.”

 

“Then who?” she asked, looking to Arthur, who now scowled at Ned.

 

“Don’t listen to him, Ashara. He has nothing but pain, grief, and death to give you. I can give you so much more… eternity, blessed eternity.”

 

Arthur’s grip on her hand grew tighter, beginning to hurt her… to burn her.

  
She looked at her brother’s hands, which seemed to have cracked and begun to chip away like old weathered paint, revealing a billowing shadow underneath. Ashara then looked to see Arthur standing in mid air upon nothing… nothing at all but the cliffs and the surging sea far below. Looking down she began to feel herself tilt as Arthur pulled—his eyes flaring with fire.

 

“Dance among the stars!”

 

Ashara screamed, tried pulling her hand out of her brother’s burning grasp which seemed to crack and fall away with every moment, revealing more of the shadow beneath.

 

She felt something else grab her about her legs and pull her down onto the balcony and out of her brother’s shadowy grip. Her brother vanished from her sight as the shadows dissipated like ash from a burning flame. And then Ashara turned to see she’d fallen on top of Ned, who’d pulled her from the ledge at the last moment. Her head had landed upon his chest and in unison they panted together, she could feel his heart racing alongside hers. And for a long instance, they were silent as they caught their breaths and Ashara came to realize that they were closer than they had been in nearly a nameday. Feeling uncomfortable with that thought, Ashara slid off of Ned and to the stone of the balcony. Her hand still burned, and she looked at it, but not a mark was upon it.

 

When he did speak, he sounded mournful, “Ashara… I’m sorry…”

Ashara did not know what to say in response, but thankful and frightened both, she leaned in and grasped him tightly. Gods, he felt real and even smelt real—her nose confirming it had been a few days since he had bathed, but in that instant, she did not care. In need of him, she brought him back to her bed, and wrapped his arms about her and tried to go back to sleep in the comfort of his embrace. In that moment all that had separated them was put aside as they were together again, and the shadows dispelled from sight—though she knew she would never be rid of them, not until her dying day. She had given her blood to Dawn without pulling it from the star, and one way or another the great brotherhood would have her for her blood. All she could do now was delay her fate.

 

~*~*~

 

“You’re going North?”

 

“Aye… Ned has asked to marry me, and I’ve accepted him,” is what she told her goodsister when she came out of her confinement with naught but a girl born dead to bury. Putting distance between her and Dawn was the only thing that made sense. It had tried once to lure her to her death, it would try again if she stayed near it. Even now, she still heard whispers in the shadows that sometimes moved on their own through the halls of Starfall. Putting salt and water between her and the sword only seemed the right thing to do, until another Sword of the Morning would arise, and bring her her death.

 

“This is the same Ned for whom you cried when he married another lady?” questioned her Manwoody goodsister. She meant well, that Ashara could see.

 

Ashara held back the heavy sigh which threatened to spill forth in that moment. “The Tully and her pup died of the pox not long after he married her, and Ned has just learned that I gave birth to his son. The gods had their say on which was his true wife.”

 

“You didn’t tell him you carried his child before now?”

 

“I had thought of it in White Harbor but couldn’t bring myself to say so.”

 

“And made your son a bastard, doing so.”

 

“Ned is confident that the new King will wipe that stain away.”

 

Her goodsister met her eyes, as though searching for some answer to explain Ashara’s actions. She asked, “Can you forgive him for what he’s put you through?”

 

Ashara wanted to say yes, in fact she knew she should, but yet something made her hesitate.

 

“How will I know until I give him a chance? He saved me from falling off my balcony, and he returned Dawn, though he could have kept it as a prize of war. We have a son together, he is honorable and he cares for me. There are worse matches that could be made.”

 

“Aye, there are… if you’re sure… I will give you my blessing in Asric’s stead. And I hope that this might be the beginning of better life for you both.”

 

Ashara gave a sad smile and replied, “Thank you.”

 

~*~*~

 

Years passed and Ashara waited for her goodsister’s words to come true. She waited as Robb was born a few moons after settling in to Winterfell, followed quickly by Serena barely a year later. Arthur came next two namedays later, with Arya three namedays after him, and lastly was Brandon, her youngest two namedays after his sister Arya. They joined Jon, who Robert had been happy to legitimize as the alpha wolf pup of her wolf pack of pups. Currently they were driving her insane as all except for Arya and Brandon were apt to be anywhere in Winterfell but where they should be. And where they should be was in the courtyard, awaiting the King’s arrival, or the Great Keep preparing for his arrival. As she headed for the entrance to the Godswood, she caught sight of Robb—boots discarded at the base of the tower and guarded by his as yet unnamed direwolf pup, who had taken to laying down on its haunches, waiting for his master to return to the earth. Robb was no doubt up high to see the approach of the royal party.

 

“Robb, get down from up there!” she shouted, though she knew it would do little good. He had gone from crawling to climbing before learning to walk, and it was one thing her second eldest son loved to do more than anything else. Coming into the nursery to discover your son gone from the crib and halfway up the wall had been shocking enough. To find that even at his gangly age of three and ten he was apt to expertly slip up a tower wall was disconcerting to say the least. Old Nan blamed Ned’s maternal grandmother being a Flint of the mountain clans, Ashara blamed Winterfell’s masons for having not smoothed its stonework over before laying the castle out. Ashara had tried forbidding him to climb when he was half his age, to little avail. And now she doubted she’d ever get him to stop.

 

“The King’s still five miles off, mother!” shouted Robb back down. His long hair, tied back in a loose pony tail that allowed loose tendrils of his dark hair to flit about his face with the wind of the height he was at, was more her shade just like he had inherited her fair skin and height. The other gift she had given him was her violet eyes, which had captivated many a nursemaid when he was a babe, and no doubt would attract many a lady in the near future. Soon it wouldn’t just be climbing she’d be afraid to have associated with her son.

 

Arya, who looked exactly like Ashara had when she was young, and had joined her along with Brandon in an effort to gather their siblings, stepped out of Ashara’s shadow and called up, “Can you see the King himself yet?”

 

“No, they’re all like little ants, but I’ll tell you the first chance I get!” Robb called down, satisfying his sister’s curiosity.

 

“You’re going to need to change, Robb! You’re likely filthy from all that climbing!” Ashara attempted to use his necessity to look somewhat decent for the King to draw her son down.

 

Her second eldest’s voice called down, “I promise to come down and change when they reach three miles, mother.”

 

Ashara pressed forth, “Given how dirty you likely are, you’ll need a bath as well.”

 

“I’ll take a dip in the godswood pools,” assured Robb.

 

“Mother said to come down… so you should!” pouted Brandon, who called up from beside her skirts to his elder brother as though he were the elder of the two. Brandon was always the more dutiful, responsible, and eager to please of all her sons. He wasn’t humorless—and he sometimes took part in Arthur’s schemes when his older brother was convinced to tolerate him—but he took anything that either Ashara or Ned said as though it were a law laid down from the Gods themselves, and any contradiction to said “law” to be a heresy. It was something that Ashara found somewhat endearing, but also worrisome too if such a high opinion of whatever she or Ned said remained long after their passing.

 

“My baby brother commands, so must I obey,” teased Robb, though he made no move to come down immediately.

 

“Aren’t you coming down?” asked Brandon after a long silence when he realized Robb was not making his move.

 

“I said I would come down, not when,” answered back Robb with what Ashara could only imagine was a cheeky grin. She rolled her eyes.

 

Brandon looked to Ashara, bewildered and perplexed, but Ashara simply bent down and took her youngest by the hand and led them off, their two well-behaved and obedient grey direwolves, Windy and Lady, following after.

 

“Come, let your brother to his games, Brandon. We have Arthur and Serena to find yet, after all,” she cooed.

 

Arya chimed in, “They’re probably in the stables.”

 

“Serena might, but right now she’s likely with Arthur.”

 

“Why?” asked Brandon.

 

“Because those two are always getting into messes about this time of the day.”

 

And as if on cue, Arthur came bolting out of the kitchens with his black direwolf pup right behind him. Where his wolf was dark, Arthur was fair. He was her only child to have inherited the Dayne pale blond hair and no one could agree exactly what color his pale colored eyes exactly were. The accounts of various people seemed to shift between a pale grey, a pale blue, and light lavender depending upon the person. Ned was convinced they were a pale grey, Ashara saw them as a light lavender, and Jon had declared them to be a pale blue when he’d first met his baby brother. It was an argument of little consequence, but it lent her son an air of mutability and mystery which suited him rather well.

 

Unlike his namesake, Arthur was rather more interested in puzzles and tricks than swordplay—which he found somewhat boring and tedious to learn. Jon had taken it upon himself to set his little brother straight in regards to this by trying to provide Arthur extra lessons with a sword that Ser Rodrik had said done more to improve Jon’s capabilities than Arthur’s. Arthur was always outwitting Jon at every turn—managing to escape and sneak off by constantly drawing the attentions of Jeyne Poole, who was trying desperately to throw herself at poor Jon in that clumsy awkward coltish way young girls were accustomed to doing. Jon, for his part was completely clueless as to the poor girl’s affections, thinking that whenever she approached him, that she was trying to find Serena or herself instead of wanting to be with or speak with him. Ashara laughed at her eldest’s clumsy cluelessness which thankfully wasn’t yet leading to the making of bastards just yet. Part of her dreaded the day when he finally would have a clue on what to do in response to Jeyne’s attentions. In any case, Arthur’s intelligence was well displayed in observing and figuring out his elder brother’s weakness like that and exploiting it. It was never taken to a malicious level, but Arthur’s cleverness should not be underestimated, nor understated, and Ashara sometimes spent hours wondering how she could find some avenue to have her son channel that talent, without his finding his own method of doing so that might be potentially harmful. Currently, he wasn’t looking where he was going, or else he wouldn’t have run right into her while carrying a large empty kettle. His direwolf likewise wasn’t blameless either, looking particularly pleased with himself over a half a honeyed chicken that he had in his maw.

 

“Mother!” exclaimed her Dayne looking son.

 

Ashara sighed as she rubbed where the kettle had hit her in the leg, hoping that would brush away the pain. It did not, but she wouldn’t let it show, and so she turned to her middle son and asked, “I’m going to hear a complaint from Gage again, aren’t I?”

 

Arthur immediately had an excuse, “’Nip said we could take what we wanted.”

 

“She likely thought you’d only take a few bites of food, not a kettle and half a chicken.”

 

Shadow, the black direwolf pup, growled, as if scared he’d lose his chicken.

 

“What do you even need a kettle for?” asked Ashara.

 

“To boil something…” said Arthur as he found his boots incredibly interesting.

 

“Is it edible?”

 

She did not get a response to that one.

 

“Put the kettle back. It’s had food in it, nothing else but food should go in it. If you truly need a kettle for something else, you can ask for Mikkon to make you one, and tell him to speak to me about it.”

 

“But I need it—” began Arthur, but Ashara gave him her look which stated that the conversation was over, and her son sighed and replied, “Yes mother.”

 

Shadow tilted his head, as if to ask if he should put the chicken back as well.

 

“As for the chicken, you can share the chicken.” There would be no putting the chicken back anyway. Not with all that wolf slobber on it.

 

Shadow snorted in response as Arthur gave a small smile and began walking back towards the kitchens.

 

“And if either Gage or Turnip come to me saying that there was a problem preparing for the feast, I’ll know exactly who to blame!” called out Ashara to the retreating form of her son. Arthur turned around and stuck his tongue out at her before running off. Despite herself, Ashara couldn’t help but laugh. He was most certainly far different in temperament from his namesake, by the Seven was he.

 

“All said, that was rather tame of him for a change,” said Ashara, forgetting who was standing beside her.

 

“What’s tame mean?” asked Brandon, Windy likewise tilting his head at an angle that coupled with her son’s head made for an adorable sight.

 

“It means… not wild. Like how your two direwolves are in comparison to… well, the rest,” explained Ashara as she picked Brandon up and took Arya’s hand with her free hand. Windy and Lady following as ever behind. Lady in fact was the tamest of them all, allowing Arya to tie ribbons in her fur to a nearly ridiculous degree, but that was Arya, her daughter loved pretty things, and as far as she was concerned, ribbons made Lady look pretty. The poor direwolf scratched at them when she thought her mistress wasn’t looking, and occasionally Ashara would help the direwolf by taking out one or two of them on the sly, but on the whole Lady allowed most of them to remain in her fur. Windy’s only distinction from his sister was how fast he could run. He was easily the fastest of the litter of pups, hence his name. Shadow had been given his name because Arthur had wanted his direwolf pup’s name to sound mysterious and intimidating. Jon had named his albino direwolf Snow—it was not very creative on Jon’s part, but then Jon was like his father and hers in being simple, blunt, and to the point, mayhaps too much so.

 

As Arya had predicted, they found Serena at the stables with Nymeria, her direwolf, having made a nest among the hay as Serena was grooming her horse, Dyanna. There were no ribbons in Dyanna’s mane, for Serena was not that kind of girl. She loved the outdoors far too much, often coming to table with her boots caked in mud, and her hair tossed by the wind. She was beginning to have the looks of a woman and was starting to outgrow her boyish appearance. She was all Stark, completely from head to toe, just like Brandon and Jon. Many in the castle said she was Lady Lyanna come again, and as her daughter grew, Ashara was beginning to see what they meant as the wild beauty of her long dead goodsister was starting to emerge. Ashara fretted over how the King would react to seeing her, hopefully Serena would still be too young to spark the comparison in his mind, and yet, Ashara worried, recalling how at the King’s marriage feast he’d drunkenly proclaimed Lyanna Stark to be the most beautiful woman to have ever lived as far as he was concerned—right in front of the entire hall and his newly married Lannister bride.

 

“You’ll stink of horses,” commented Ashara, without entering the stables.

 

“I’ll bathe in the godswood when I’m done,” contradicted Serena, something she was more apt to do of late. Ned called it wolf’s blood, Ashara called it being contrary.

 

“Be sure to beat your brother there when you do. And wear your green dress,” commented Ashara.

 

“But Serena looks prettier in the blue dress!” whined Arya. Lyanna had worn blue at Harrenhal, Ashara did not want the comparison.

 

“I thought you wanted me dressed in my best dress for the King?” questioned Serena, curious as to why Ashara was suggesting the green dress, which was almost fit for retiring from wearing formally with how girlish and young it made Serena look.

 

“You can save the blue for the feast.” By then the King ought to have his mind and matters elsewhere, hopefully—or be too drunk to notice. “For now, wear your green dress with the silver and white trimmings.”

 

Serena frowned, but simply continued to brush down Dyanna, who rather lazily nibbled at some hay near Nymeria—who looked to be asleep in the hay at this point and unbothered by the horse’s sniffing around the direwolf. Nymeria was wild where Lady was tame and aptly named. Except for Snow, Nymeria seemed often to boss around the other direwolves. Snow was the only one which Nymeria deferred to. Windy, happy to see his packmate no doubt, playfully jumped into the hay next to her, only to wake Nymeria up who barked and growled at having been disturbed, causing Windy to whimper and back down. The entire scene disturbed Ashara to see. It was at moments like that that she was reminded that these direwolves were not overgrown dogs, but only barely tamed creatures.

 

“Which dress will you be wearing after you bathe?” asked Ashara as she turned to leave.

 

“The green one,” parroted Serena back to her.

 

To be sure, Ashara thought of having the maids hide the blue dress for the duration of the King’s visit. It might be safer that way.

 

~*~*~

 

“And is this the quiet little baby you brought to the capital all those years ago?” questioned the King.

 

She couldn’t argue that all of her children were here and presentable. That they were. Jon, who was completely his father in looks, stood proud and tall at the head of his siblings as the now rather fat King moved from hugging and giving Ashara a quick peck on her cheek to examining her and Ned’s children.

 

“Why Ned, he’s just like you were back at the Eyrie,” guffawed the King with a knowing glance.

 

“Not entirely,” stated Ned from Ashara’s side. Ashara knew he was restraining himself from giving a sidelong glance at Theon Greyjoy, who had deemed only Jon worthy enough of his attentions and had taken it upon himself to “make a man” out of Jon lately, despite not being one himself as far as Ashara was concerned. She was not a prude by any stretch of the definition, but by the same dragon, she wasn’t Salty Dornish either. Paramours were acceptable, customary even. If Jon had formed an attachment with a young maid, Ashara wouldn’t have batted an eye, simply asked Jon that he treat the girl and any children he might have off of her, with dignity and respect. However, Theon favored whores—and who knows what kind of diseases they might have, the poor things. Theon had been caught with Jon by Jory in the local Wintertown whorehouse which doubled as an inn. From what Ashara had been able to get out of Jon, he’d done nothing more than kissing so far, but she knew that that wouldn’t last for forever.

 

“Oh ho? I’m going to have to ask you about that later, when your mother isn’t in earshot,” emphasized the King with a wink that only caused Jon to blush. Ashara frowned. Jon wouldn’t like for the King to corner him and admit the truth of his extent, nor likely the publicity the King was giving the issue presently.

 

“I would prefer you wouldn’t. You forget, your grace, I am Dornish,” said Ashara with a smile, knowing that would be the exact thing to say.

 

“True. So that’s what the old Stark blood needed to melt just a little, eh? A little Dornish Red in the mix.” The King laughed so hard at that one, that Ashara found she wasn’t the only one rolling her eyes at that—Ned doing so for her.

 

Ashara smiled, used to the barbs that being “Dornish” were typically thrown at her by some of the more reserved Northerners. At least if she was going to be forever saddled with the label, she could use it to her own advantages—and protecting her son from further humiliation was one of them as far as she was concerned.

 

By now the King seemed to have lost interest in Jon and moved on to Robb.

 

“Wait, I thought you said he was your heir?” asked the King with confusion. Robb grinned and puffed out his chest proudly at that comment. He’d always been in Jon’s shadow growing up, but now that he was the taller one of the two, Robb was rather happy to be confused by others to be the elder of the two brothers. Jon was destined to grow, of that Ashara had little doubt, but he’d never be as tall as Robb was promising to be. Comparing him to Jon, one might have mistook Jon for the younger brother as Robb had had a growth spurt that had shot him up over Jon by near a head, something else Robb had inherited from her beyond the dark hair, fairer skin, and violet eyes. His height surely came from Ashara’s Uncle Seryn, who had wielded the Sword of the Morning before Arthur had, and had been well over six feet tall, if not close to seven feet.

“He’s my little brother, your grace, I can well remember when he was born,” interjected Jon, who had taken care to emphasize his brother’s earliest years rather frequently to embarrass him in situations like this. Something which only caused the two to fight from time to time over the stupidest of things.

 

“Younger, not little,” countered Robb, as he was want to do.

 

The King laughed a little sadly as he patted Robb on the shoulder and remarked, “Brothers… always fighting.”

 

 And then the King came to Serena, who wasn’t in her green dress, nor her blue dress. Instead she wore a white one which had yet to be adorned with any direwolf, due to her own lack of skill and interest in needlework. She gave a quick curtsey and the King quietly looked at her, and a pregnant pause filled the air.

 

“You’re a fine girl… you’ll be a beauty one day, no doubt,” was all that the King was able to say before moving on to Arthur.

 

“My… you’re a strapping young lad! You’ll be a fine soldier one day,” exclaimed the King with a bit more merriment.

 

Arthur’s face contorted, but thankfully he just allowed the King to tussle his hair and move on without comment, with Arthur only brushing it back into place as the King admired Arya’s beauty.

 

“You’re sure to be just as pretty as your mother one day!” exclaimed the King, causing Arya to giggle and playfully hide her face with her hair.

 

It was about this time that the Queen, the Lannister, stepped forward to greet Ned, having waited for a long enough distance to be put between herself and her husband, Ashara noted. Not that she blamed the woman, if their wedding feast had been any example of how their marriage had turned out. Ned kissed the hand that she held out before she even came within reach.

 

“You’re named for your Uncle, am I right?” boomed the King.

 

“Aye,” answered Brandon from afar.

 

“And what will you do to be different from all the other Brandons that came before ye?” questioned the King.

 

It was at this point that the Queen met Ashara, and Ashara knew her place well enough to curtsey and murmur, “My Queen.”

 

“A good lad!” proclaimed the King as he patted Brandon on the head. The King then called for Ned to show him the crypts, and Ned departed almost as if he were an obedient guard dog being called to his master.

 

“Your beauty has preserved itself very well for this far North, Lady Stark,” commented the Queen as she rose from her curtsey.

 

“I thank my mother for that, your grace. She did not show signs of her age until she was a few years from her deathbed.”

 

“Pity your eldest daughter was not as blessed with the same maternal gift,” replied the Queen who then withdrew, ignoring the children, and in that instant earning Ashara’s hatred.

 

~*~*~

 

“She insulted our daughter, to my face!” she raged that night when Ned and she had retired for the night.

 

“The more fool her for provoking your wrath,” retorted Ned with a snort as he leaned in closer to kiss her.

 

Ashara however was still too riled up from the insult to be interested in much else at the moment, and she let Ned know this by turning her head from his and emphasizing, “If she weren’t the Queen, I’d have slapped her for the comment.”

 

Ned sighed, and asked, “What do you want me to do about it?”

 

“Do? What is there to do?”

 

“I could talk to Robert—”

 

“Ned, don’t waste your time, the Queen won’t listen anyway.”

 

“Then I fail to understand what will make my wife happy.”

 

Ashara nearly laughed at his response before admitting, “Just listening is enough for now.”

 

“Aye… I can do that... but I wonder if it’ll make up for tripping over my feet at the feast.” Ned was exaggerating, he wasn’t a nimble dancer by any means—nor was he the awkward boy that she’d danced with at Harrenhal, he was far better than he used to be, but clearly only danced because she wanted to.

 

Ashara smirked and then teased, “I’m not sure that that will be a sufficient enough an apology for that.”

 

He kissed her and pulled themselves together, saying, “Well, I have an idea of what might cover my remaining debts,” returned Ned with a smirk followed quickly with a nibble at her neck. He was in her not long thereafter, firm and eager for the act, and she content with her lot, especially… oh especially as he continued after he had… oh aye… this was most assuredly worth being Lady of Winterfell for—or—oh!

 

When they were done, Ned opened the window and Ashara slipped on her wool night robe to join him as he looked down at the courtyard below and allowed the cool air to ease his spirits between rounds. He had his debts to pay after all.

 

“Did he ask?” questioned Ashara as she wrapped her arms about her husband’s sweaty form. Ned had been worried about the King’s journey north ever since the raven had arrived at Winterfell. You wouldn’t have known it, to have only seen Ned’s face, but more often than naught he wore it more like a mask than let any genuine feeling flit across it, especially in public.

 

“Aye… right in front of Lyanna’s statue too,” grumbled Ned.  
  
“The man always had the sense of the mummer about him,” replied Ashara grimly.

 

“Don’t,” begged Ned.

 

“It’s the truth! A true King needn’t play the part as if he were in a farce.”

 

“Just like a true lord needn’t adopt a face to rule his lands?” questioned Ned.

 

Ashara said nothing. In truth there was little she could say. It was the one shadow that lay between them anymore, the specter of Brandon and that Winterfell, the North, and the Lord Paramountcy all should have been his.

 

“You are Lord Stark,” she assured him, though she knew it would do little good. He would go on feeling inadequate no matter what she said.

 

“As you reminded me when we first reconciled,” he retorted with the slight turn of his head.

 

“Do you want to fight?”

 

He then turned his head and leaned in to kiss her after whispering, “No.”

 

When she came up for air, she pushed him just enough away to look straight into his eyes and firmly say, “Then let things go, Ned. Let the past be buried and dead.”

 

He was quiet for a moment, always so bloody quiet, before he responded, “You would say that.”

 

They were just beginning to return to her collection of his debts when that bloody Maester chose to interrupt and everything changed.

 

 

~*~*~

 

 

Robb lay sprawled on his bed as though he were dead. Truth be told he was lucky to be alive, though he’d yet to have awoken from the deep slumber he suffered from. Brandon surprisingly had been the most affected by Robb’s fall, choosing to sleep in his brother’s room—Windy and Robb’s unnamed wolf curled up protectively at the foot of the bed. Brandon had fought her to be removed from the room—even Ned he refused. Somehow little Brandon was both upset and angry not just at Robb for falling, but also himself for some odd reason. Robb had been the older brother who had paid him any mind. Arthur she knew had always considered their little brother too much a snitch, calling him the “well-trained pup” as Arthur was want to tease his baby brother—and Jon, while understanding his youngest brother’s nature, didn’t like how clingy Brandon could be from time to time. Brandon had at first tried following Jon about everywhere, eager to emulate him in every way, which had only sparked a small rebellious streak in Jon—trying to find some way to shake off the irritating tag-a-long, only forcing him deeper into Theon’s corrupting clutches. Robb however had never minded Brandon hiding behind his legs when Arthur chased after him, had always comforted his baby brother when Jon showed a lack of interest by playing a silly game, nor had he objected when Brandon asked to ride his back so that Brandon could feel how it was to be as tall as Robb. Robb of course wasn’t a fan of always being stuck with his baby brother but considering that Arthur tormented little Brandon and Jon felt the distance of their age between them more acutely, Robb took the matter of brotherly affection on himself in their steads for the nonce. Mayhaps when Brandon was older, they’d feel differently. That of course didn’t mean Robb didn’t tease Brandon from time to time, but on the whole the brothers had been closer despite the gap in their ages, and to see how greatly disturbed Brandon was by Robb’s affliction, pained Ashara’s wounded heart all the more, and brought her back from her own near brink of revisiting memories she had thought long buried, of dead brothers holding out hands, inviting her to dance among the stars. No, she could not let Brandon get as bad as she had, and Robb couldn’t let it happen either—he wouldn’t, not to little Brandon. Her son just couldn’t die, not after surviving that fall from that blasted old tower, that would be cruel of the gods. And so she took Robb’s hand in her own and prayed to any and all Gods, old and new, not to take her son—she could not bear it, she would not bear it.

 

And that is when Serena entered the room, Ashara saw the pups’ attention rise immediately upon the entrance of their elder packmate, who padded across the floor and took a seat at the foot of the bed rather regally for a direwolf.

 

“Mother, must I go south?”

 

“South?” asked Ashara, turning to look at her daughter plainly, “Why in the name of the gods would you wish to go south?”

 

“I don’t want to, but the King wants me betrothed to his son, and father has agreed.”

 

If Serena went south, then Ashara would almost certainly be required to travel south to King’s Landing as well, especially given her “experience” at court, as the Queen had so coyly put it at the feast. A pale white sword, glowing as it was pulled from the fallen star flittered before her eyes for but a moment. Flaming reddish-purple eyes and hands which burned to touch, the memory of which caused Ashara to recoil. This was the sword’s doing… it must have been taken across salt and water, and now it was calling to her… calling for her to be its sheath.

 

“Must I, mother?” asked Serena, with the pleading pouting look she had always used on her father whenever she’d been caught on some mischief, that always caused her to wiggle out of whatever trouble she was in.

 

“You have been poorly educated in the manners of a lady of the court… I would hate to see you put your father and our family to shame to go to court as such.”

 

This was hardly the answer which pleased her lip biting daughter, but it was the one that the King and Queen might accept for why the Prince’s new betrothed wasn’t to spend time with him.

 

~*~*~

 

“Why did you agree to it?” she asked Ned when she had freshened up afore the evening meal.

 

“That was Robert’s price for refusing him to be Hand of the King.”

 

There were moments when Ashara loved her husband’s blunt honesty, this was not one of them. She scoffed and began to pace about the solar.

 

“Again with the pacing?” he asked with a groan.

 

“Then tell me that this betrothal is broken, and that our daughter will not have to go South to marry that boy.”

 

“And what is so wrong with Robert’s son?”

 

“Do not tell me you have been blinded by your love of Robert to not see what even Bran sees. I’ve watched how the Prince conducts himself in the practice yard when he thinks no one but the children are about… he’s arrogant beyond all measure and likes the taste of danger too well.”

 

Ned was quiet for a moment, before responding, “He is still young yet, and it might just be a passing phase of the Prince’s.”

 

“And I’m sure all boys hide the phases they are going through from the adults they spend their days with.”

 

“It is just a betrothal my love… a marriage, if it happens it would not happen for years. And besides, our daughter will not be alone in the capital if it happens.”

 

That could only mean one thing. “No, not any of them.”

 

“No, Lord Beric Dondarrion, whom I convinced the Robert to name Hand in my stead.”

 

“Dondarrion? Why should he comfort me?”

 

“Robert would not accept his brother Stannis as hand, and I wouldn’t let him choose a Lannister. So I did what could for both your sakes. Lord Beric is a Stormlord, aye, and a Marcher Lord besides with men of his own, and a leal man of Robert’s. Robert could use more loyal men about him.”

 

“That still doesn’t explain how it should comfort me that Serena would be protected in the South.”

 

“Did you forget Allyria’s letter?”

 

At mention of it, Ashara immediately understood what Ned meant. Allyria was to wed Beric Dondarrion before the year was out as her youngest sister was finally comfortable enough with Ned’s maturity to see him Lord of Starfall since their brother’s death that she could wed. Her nephew Ned would of course though be kept close for safety’s sake as squire to Lord Beric—but—oh gods be damned!

 

“But that means Ned will be in King’s Landing too.”

 

Ned looked confused for a moment until he too seemed to recall all the details from Allyria’s letter himself and then frowned.

 

“While Edric is young, true, he is kin and Lord Dayne in his own right which affords its own respect.”

 

“What’s true enough for Serena is true enough for Ned.”

 

“Do you truly doubt Allyria and her betrothed to be cautious with him?”

 

“No, but—”

 

“And if anything, Edric would be in the perfect position to make allies and if Serena’s marriage would happen, Edric would be a man grown and near enough a knight, as well as likely to have enough contacts within that adder’s pit to ensure our daughter’s escape to Starfall should the worst arise.”

 

Ashara felt a twinge in her heart, as though something cold and sharp had pierced it.

 

“I admire the thought, but if I cannot allow my daughter to be in King’s Landing, what kind of Aunt would I be to see my nephew there, even with Dondarrion there to protect him.”

 

Ned sighed and had the honesty to admit, “I can’t argue against that. But if I go to Robert asking him to change his mind yet again, he’ll only want me in King’s Landing, or he’ll take Tywin to spite us.”

 

“Then I must write a letter to Starfall myself and see if I can get my sister to change her mind on who to squire our nephew to,” she said and turned to leave the solar to do just that.

 

He caught her arm before she could leave, showing exactly the spirit that she fell in love with about him when she’d learned that he’d taken in a wounded and humiliated bannerman into his own tent at Harrenhal, “Before you ask, the answer is yes, my love.”

 

It was a pact between them, then sealed with a kiss.

 

~*~*~

 

The remaining nights of the King’s stay were haunted for Ashara. She dreamed she was climbing the Palestone Tower at Starfall, the stairs growing with each step she took until they had grown taller than her requiring her to climb each step as though it were a mountain itself. Biting at her heels, pushing her always onward were shadows with reddish-purple eyes and hands like daggers which grabbed at her ankles and tried pulling her from her climb, but she kicked and pulled herself free with determination, certain that safety was there at the top. It was there she found Arthur and Asric reaching out for her to help her up the last step and up into the moonlight, but this time the shadows grabbed her and with a power they had yet to demonstrate ripped her from the stairs and down into darkness where nothing but reddish-purple eyes looked on eagerly as though they were starving. Even after she’d wake up screaming not long thereafter, she swore she could feel the sharp scratches where the shadows had torn at her as she’d fallen in her dream, though she always awoke without any harm.

 

When the letter from Starfall arrived after the King’s departure, it was not from Allyria, but the castellan, Ser Drystane, who had written to inform that Allyria had already departed Starfall for Dondarrion’s castle, taking Dawn with her as their High Hermitage cousins were wont to have the sword if left unattended by a Dayne. That surely explained the dreams, but it was now too late to keep Ned from King’s Landing... unless Dondarrion could be convinced himself to leave off the honor of taking Ned as his squire and sending him North to them.

 

That too however proved more difficult than a simple letter could convey. She received in response a polite missive by raven which between observing customary niceties dismissed her concerns. Lord Beric had only just received the invitation from the King to come and be named Hand of the King, and her nephew, who had already begun his training, was eager to see the capital for himself. Allyria also had decided that during the Tourney to which they were to celebrate Beric’s being named Hand, that they should wed and an invitation was extended to her and Ned to come for the ceremony and celebration. Ashara was immediately torn, she wished desperately to see her little sister again, and yet she couldn’t help but feel danger for herself and her kin lay in King’s Landing—and not just from the Lannisters who were likely seething at Tywin having been passed over as Hand for not just another Lord Paramount, but a lowly marcher lord like Beric, but also from Dawn itself. The nightmares were growing stronger, the further North the sword came. It was calling to her… telling her that she could not escape it, no matter how hard she tried.

 

“Mother, what’s wrong?” interrupted Jon in that moment, startling her from her quandary in the old lichfield where she’d come for some peace and quiet to read Dondarrion’s letter. Oddly it was only among the dead did she feel truly safe.

 

Hastily rolling the parchment, she said, “I just received some news from your Aunt Allyria… she is to be wed earlier than expected.”

 

“That wouldn’t upset you so,” observed her eldest as he took a seat on the stone bench beside her. Jon knew her too well for her to lie successfully to him, and he was too like Ned for her to expect him to be at any ease until she was honest with him.

 

“I had tried to convince your soon-to-be Uncle that mayhaps he should let someone else squire your cousin while he’s Hand of the King. He will, of course have many additional duties and not enough time to see to Ned’s training—”

 

“And why would you wish that? Being squire to the Hand of the King would be a great honor for Ned.”

 

“Aye, such a great honor that many would kill for it.”

 

At this her son understood her meaning.

 

“A son cannot remain in his family’s care for forever,” muttered Jon, looking away as he said that.

 

She could not hold her tears back. “Except he is your Uncle’s only surviving heir. If were to die… it would be like… like losing your uncles all over again…”

 

Jon said nothing as he allowed his mother to cry in the embrace they then shared. He knew too little of Asric and Arthur and had too much of the North in him to join in her tears, but he did wrap his arms about her to show the feelings he did not speak.

 

“He won’t be killed… Daynes are like Dawn, tougher than Valyrian steel.”

 

Ashara tried to regain some composure then, seeing the folly of her eldest son, still a child though on the cusp of manhood, comforting his own mother. “I’m sorry… I shouldn’t be crying like this, but with Robb between life and death and Serena’s betrothal, I’m all a mess.”

 

Jon only responded by holding her tighter and saying, “I’d rather have you crying on my should than not have you at all.”

 

_What an odd comment to make._

 

She pushed him away just enough to meet his eyes and asked, “What do you mean, Jon?”

 

Jon had always been a piss poor liar, and today was no exception. “I… I shouldn’t have said anything.”

 

“Tell me.”

 

It wasn’t an order or a command, but an endearment that only a mother could implore of her own children.

 

“It’ll upset you,” was his next excuse.

 

“I’m already upset, you can’t make that any worse than it is,” said Ashara.

 

Abashedly, Jon avoided her eyes as he said, “I have been having dreams the past few weeks… I am walking through Winterfell, and I’m trying to find you for some reason, but I always seem to be just missing you, as though I were a room away from where you are. I can hear you in the next room, or I just see you as you are leaving through a window, but I can never catch up to you. I call out to you, scream for you, but you can never hear me. Eventually I end up at the Broken Tower where I see strange things…”

 

“What strange things?” she asked as Jon tried that irritating habit he inherited from her mother of leaving off instead of finishing his thoughts aloud. As though Ashara were expected to know his thoughts without saying them. Ashara had found the habit irritating in her mother, and while at times she thought it sweet her son had something of his grandmother in him, there were other times like these when she wished it had been some other trait like her mother’s smile or her humor—Jon could’ve done well to have received her humor.

 

Jon’s eyes met hers and suddenly, Ashara felt as though it wasn’t just Jon saying these things to her, odd though that thought seemed.

 

“Shadows that aren’t flat like they are on a summer’s day, but standing up on their own, without any body to cast them. They have hands like claws and eyes with a reddish-purple color that bore right through you to see them. They are gathered round the base of the tower, most looking up and reaching…”

 

“Reaching for what?”

Jon sighed before admitting, “For Robb. Robb’s falling and the shadows are clawing at him. They’ve almost caught him… and then they turn and see me, and some begin to reach out for me.”

 

Ashara felt a cold shiver run down her spine in that moment. Not in her entire life at Winterfell, through all the Winters had she ever felt so bone chillingly cold in her life until that moment.

 

“It’s a night terror, that’s all. You’re just dreaming about your brother’s fall.”

 

Jon looked at her, and she knew he knew she wasn’t telling him the entire truth, but then without seeing the star from which Dawn had been forged, the pale white rock, paler than even a weirwood’s bark, could he understand its power? No… of that she was certain. Jon was a Stark, not a Dayne, and thereby not subject to Dawn’s laws and rules like she. And mayhaps that’s all it was, a simple night terror. Aye, that’s what it surely was, she was sure of it.

 

“Mother, is there something you’re not telling me?” asked Jon, reminding her of her father’s ability to cut immediately through whatever she said.

 

Ashara was going to assure her eldest that no, there was nothing, but then she saw a figure standing at the entrance to the graveyard, distracting her attention. The figure looked altogether familiar, and yet at the distance she could not tell who it was, all dressed in black standing there, watching her and Jon.

 

“Who goes there?” called out Ashara, catching Jon by surprise as she pushed past her son and towards the lone figure standing by the entrance to the lichfield.

 

“Mother…” began Jon behind her, but Ashara hurried her pace, eager to see who it was, compelled by some force which drove her on. The figure became more distinguishable as a man, whose face was hidden by the black hood which he wore.

 

“Mother! Where are you going?” called Jon.

 

She was almost halfway to the entrance of the lichfield.

 

And then she heard it, whispered on the wind, _“Child of Dayne…”_

 

Ashara stopped, feeling frozen to the spot. The black figure was approaching, stepping into the lichfield, reaching for her, appearing gaunt, pale, and distorted.

 

“Mother!” said Jon, this time pulling her attention away from the figure and back to him.

 

“What are you doing?”

 

“There’s a man—” began Ashara but when she turned back, the figure was gone.

 

“There’s nothing there. I think you need to rest… come,” said Jon as he took her hand and began leading her like father had been won’t to do. Ashara was too shocked to argue as her son pulled her along back towards the Great Keep. When did he get to be so strong?

 

~*~*~

 

She was woken from her slumber in her chambers in the middle of the night by one of her handmaids, saying that Brandon was screaming for her in the nursery. How had Brandon been coaxed back to the nursery when he’d barely left Robb’s side all this time, Ashara knew not, but as she strode through the passageways and up stairs to the nursery, she wondered if the idea had been one of the younger nursemaids’. Her youngest son was screaming at the top of his lungs, kicking and screaming like Arthur had been wont to do when younger, which was rather unlike Brandon, her obedient boy. Windy paced back and forth in the nursery, no doubt upset that at his master’s screams. Upon seeing her, though, Brandon’s eyes locked upon hers immediately and Ashara swore that rather than his sea blue-green eyes, they were a reddish-purple for but a momentary flash. Mayhaps it had been a trick of the firelight, or her own imagination, but Ashara tried desperately to send the image from her mind as she sat upon the bed and brought her youngest into her embrace. Like a shipwrecked sailor, Brandon clung to her as though she were the only piece of driftwood in a tempest. Ashara hushed and rubbed her fingers through her son’s hair, calming his panicked breathing—which also soothed his wolf pup oddly enough. She then dismissed the other servants and encouraged a sleepy Arya and worried Lady to return to their own slumbers as she tended to Brandon.  
  
“Now, tell me, what frightened you so?” asked Ashara.

 

“The shadow men… they can see,” whimpered Brandon into her robe.

 

“W—what do you mean the shadows can see?”

 

“Not shadows! Shadow men!” insisted Brandon fiercely.

 

“A night terror is all. Shadows cannot see,” assured Ashara, feeling increasingly uncomfortable by the entire conversation as she swore she heard the fire whisper _“live by the sword…”_

 

“Nuh uh. Robb said they are real!”

 

“Robb said—have you had this dream before Robb fell?”

 

“No. Only after. But Robb said I’d be safer in the nursery from them.”

 

“Robb’s awake?”

 

“Nuh uh, he told me in a dream.”

 

_“dance among the stars…”_ Ashara heard as the wind rattled the shutters to the nursery.

 

“Sweetling, Robb couldn’t possibly—”

 

“Robb’s fighting them, Mama, he’s fighting them, but he couldn’t fight them and protect me, so he said to go back to the nursery, that they wouldn’t follow me here… but they did.”

 

“Fighting them how? How do you fight shadow men?”

 

At this Ashara did not get an answer from her son, who seemed to have stopped trembling at her side and instead stared at the foot of the bed, at which Ashara stared and felt her blood run cold. Windy growled, Arya screamed, and Ashara could only gasp in terror even as every sense in her body told her to scoop Brandon up, grab Arya and run from the room. Standing, no looming at the foot of a bed was what could only be described as one of Brandon’s shadow men, the same shape of figure who she’d seen in the lichfield earlier, and the same reddish-purple eyes that now glared at her and haunted her dreams since Dawn had returned to Starfall. The shutters were rattling terribly with the wind now.

 

She heard a voice and Brandon’s speak in unison, saying “Blood for blood, either yours or one of theirs.”

 

It was then the shutters blew open, bringing the wind inside, extinguishing the fire, and pouring in the moonlight into the smoke-filled nursery, from which everyone had to leave coughing, including the wolves.

 

~*~*~

 

Ashara had made up her mind. Dawn had made its point clear terrifying if not also maiming her own children. If she continued to avoid it, now that it had crossed salt and water, her children would meet the end it had designed for her, and that… that she could not abide. She would have to pass on the story of the sword to Ned, though she felt he was too young to truly understand the grievous weight that came with desiring to be the Sword of the Morning, and the costs that such a title came with.

 

Ned tried to persuade her to stay, but he was a Stark, and a Stark who had forgotten his own magic that ran in his blood. A Dayne could not afford to forget, try though she had might. The Starks might have been protected from their dead by Iron, but what could calm Dawn was only blood, her blood. Her pretense for going South was to witness Allyria’s wedding at the Tourney, though none of her children would attend, with only Ned and Ser Rodrik for company, leaving Winterfell in the hands of Jon and Vayon Poole. She had made her goodbyes to the children seem light, as though they would all meet again once the wedding had finished, though part of her knew that this time would be the last time she’d ever see them again in her life. Ashara did her best to hold back her tears until they were on the road, at which point she looked to Ned and reached for his hand, his quiet, steady, reliable hand which gladly took hers. She would likely regret bringing him South with her—especially the pain that it would cause him—but his companionship was the one weakness she could afford herself as she rode to face the destiny she knew awaited her in King’s Landing. She’d have to be strong in the face of death, like Arthur had been… like a Dayne would. Live by the sword, die by the sword.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, it's not how I originally imagined it would end, but I'm satisfied enough with it to say it's finished and move on to working on my other projects for the nonce. My long awaited Lady of Winterfell second chapter featuring Ashara Dayne is finished. For this one I decided to entertain a theory proposed by the Order of the Greenhand on the Ashara and Ned relationship, just for something fresh to explore in this relationship as part of the backstory. In any case, do enjoy as I had a fun time exploring Ashara's relationships with this version of her Stark family, and an interpretation of Dawn and the Sword of the Morning that I stole from myself in concept from my Bound in Brotherhood story--largely inspired by GRRM tropes from his other writings, well, at least my take on his tropes. Enjoy.


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